Articles Written By: Sky

Manouche Willie

  • Posted on 30/04/2013
  • /Under Musique

williemarijane»Django’s Orchid Lounge [on Maui] is my little hideout on the ocean«, country superstar Willie Nelson writes in his 2012 memoir Roll Me Up and Smoke Me If I Die. »My brother-in-law named it Django’s Orchid Lounge since he knows how much I love Django Reinhardt. For those who don’t know, Django Reinhardt is the greatest guitar player who ever lived.« Introduced to the sound of Django by guitar teacher Paul Buskirk in 1955, Willie pays tribute to his guitar hero on his brand new album Let’s Face the Music and Dance with a fine, inspired version of Reinhardt’s all-time classic Nuages. And last not least, Our Holy Lord of the Trademark Pigtails is celebrating his 80th birthday today – the Willie way, for sure. Congrats from the FS staff!

Willie Nelson – Nuages

Under the Radar (3): Jeff Lynne

  • Posted on 29/04/2013
  • /Under Musique

lynnewaveJeff Lynne’s latest album Long Wave is nearly about 28 min. It features eleven tunes that sound … well, a bit like he tried to pull a portable radio out of the dungheap in his well-groomed Beverly Hills garden. Conceived as an hommage to the songs that shaped his youth, the album hardly achieves more than beaming Golden Age classics, Chuck Berry and Roy Orbison into the realm of Lackluster Alley. The most memorable song might be its opener, a last call adaptation of The Aznavour’s lofty ’74 longing melodrama She a.k.a. Tous les visages de l’amour. And in comparison to Elvis Costello’s slime-from-Notting-Hill version, we’re certainly talking world class wavelength here.

Jeff Lynne – She
Charles Aznavour – She

Maria Goes to the Movies

  • Posted on 24/03/2013
  • /Under Musique

mariamar1974’s Les Valseuses was a nice kick in the teeth of the bourgeoisie, a movie like they don’t make ’em anymore starring the young Gérard Depardieu, lovely Miou-Miou and of course the immortal Patrick Dewaere. The main theme of the beautiful soundtrack, written and performed by jazz violin legend Stéphane Grappelli, now comes to life again on Maria Markesini’s cinephile sound journey Cinema Passionata, also featuring a piece from Jacques Demy’s Demoiselles de Rochefort, and lots of other stuff from The Big Lebowsky to Amistad. Markesini, born on the Greek Island of Kefalonia and living in the Netherlands, is a chanteuse to watch. Her approach, oscillating between grand pop aria and Bobby McFerrin on crystal meth, doubtless has class, but also gets a bit tiring in the long run.

Maria Markesini – Rolls (Theme from Les Valseuses)

Apollinaire’s Pink Hotel

  • Posted on 16/03/2013
  • /Under Musique

midtsomThe folks at legendary East German youth radio station DT64 were the first to air songs by GDR blues rockers Keimzeit in 1980, though their first album – titled Irrenhaus (Loony Bin) was only released ten years later, when the Wall finally had vanished. Their new album Midtsommer under the moniker Keimzeit Akustik Quintett features two French lingo cover versions, Trenet’s La Mer and Pink Martini’s 1997 million seller Sympatique – though on PM’s album the credits go to band members China Forbes and Thomas Lauderdale, the lyrics were drawn from Guillaume Apollinaire’s poem Hôtel, already used by French composer and Groupe des Six member Francis Poulenc for his 1940 piece Banalités, FP 107: ii. Hôtel.

Keimzeit Akustik Quintett – Sympathique

Motorbikin’ with Mademoiselle

  • Posted on 15/03/2013
  • /Under Musique

carolacThe promo sheet tells us that Caroline Lacaze moved to Hamburg last year, and that’s where she also recorded her debut album En Route. It’s an okay one, though she’s apparently still under way; somehow the CD feels like she’s a bit undecided where she’s really heading, riding along the city limits of Chanson Beach, Funk Falls or Soulboro, and stopping a few times on the outskirts of Sixtiesville looking out for April March and Fabienne Delsol – including the instrumental garage beat of Road Stop and a cover version of Brigitte & Serge’s immortal 1967 Harley Davidson that suddenly sounds like that machine was always part of the feelgood soul soundtrack of The Commitments.

Caroline Lacaze – Harley Davidson

Le French Touch

Directed by Simone Rovellini, this smart and whimsical parable shows what life becomes when it’s all chic, charme, champagne, décollete, lingerie, femme fatale and ménage à trois. There you are: Le fabuleux stéréotype d’Amélie in playful five minutes.

Extra: The perfect musical equivalent to Rovellini’s short film is undoubtedly R.S.V.P. by British postmodernists The Monochrome Set, the most nonchalant tongue-in-cheek cliché song ever written.

Monochrome Set – R.S.V.P.

Cowhand from Quebec

  • Posted on 15/02/2013
  • /Under Musique

Bild 2A mixture between Hank Williams’s sobbing and a damp washcloth, the original schmaltz sound of Charley Pride stormed the American charts in August 1969 with All I Have to Offer You (Is Me); probably ten million Texans bought the record before they discovered on the Johnny Cash Show that the godlike country crooner was one of those guys the Klan had used to deal with in Hank’s golden days. However, over there in Quebec also a French version was released on the aptly named Ranch label, performed by a certain Ray Perry, who was every bit as cheesy as the black Nashville giant himself – but for some strange reason, this time nobody jumped at the irresistible offer, not even when it came from the dollar bin.

Ray Perry – Tout ce que je peux t’offrir, c’est moi

Velvet Goldmine

  • Posted on 13/02/2013
  • /Under Musique

Velvelettes_60sMotown, early Sixties. The Velvelettes were not quite as big as labelmates The Supremes or Martha & The Vandellas, but certainly supersexy, and on their debut single There He Goes they were accompanied by none other than young Stevie Wonder on harmonica. The most popular and best remembered song of Millie, Norma and Bertha was Needle in a Haystack, hitting the US charts in mid 1964. Four of their songs were also cut in French language versions, produced and written by Pierre Berjot in February of ’63 – renaming Motown’s headquarters from Hitsville U.S.A. to Hitsville France for some all-too ephemeral, but highly alluring moments.

Merci à Roy B.

Velvelettes – Je veux crier
Velvelettes – Le Hoky Poky
Velvelettes – Tu perds le plus merveilleux garçon du monde
Velvelettes – Puisque je sais qu’il est à moi

Paris Blues

  • Posted on 05/02/2013
  • /Under Video

Dalida was the star, Gainsbourg the piano player. Lovely Italian-French collaboration from the completely forgotten »L’inconnue de Hongkong« (1963).

Are Girlfriends Electric?

Try to voice this name, and then try again: Evelyne Ranaivorarivony. According to Discogs, it’s the real name of Nini Raviolette, who released her one and only single in 1980: Suis-Je Normale?, a minimalist, freezoid stun-gun of a song that also opened 2004’s So Young But So Cold sampler. Now the song can be found again on Change the Beat, a brand new compilation celebrating the history of the legendary Celluloid label, still clinically cold, clinically disturbed, and still waiting for the right answer.

Nini Raviolette – Suis-Je Normale?

← Newer Posts
Older Posts →