Musique
Les Soeurs Boulay
Guestpost! Steve on the new Les Soeurs Boulay album:
So my eagerly awaited event this month is the release of Les Soeurs Boulay’s debut album ‘Le poids des confettis’ (The weight of confetti). Regular readers may already know that since I discovered their eponymous EP, I have been deeply enamoured with the angelic crispness of the girls’ vocal harmonies… But would the album live up to my expectations? I’ve placed Gaspé’s Melanie and Stéphanie Boulay on such a high pedestal that if they were to slip they’d be surely shattered into a thousand pieces…
One listen and any fears have long since been dispelled. The girls’ haunting melodies are still there to the fore, but there’s a new found certain assuredness which can be discerned not only in the reinterpretation of the songs off their earlier EP, but also those debuting on this album. There’s an added depth and warmth to the rhythmic melodies which as always complements the fresh clarity of the sisters’ vocal style – none more so than on “Un trou noir au bout d’un appât”
There’s more than a hint of early Simon and Garfunkel, especially the way their voices are almost telepathically intertwined (Check out there cover of “The Boxer” here), and on “Chanson de Route”, there’s the added benefit of highlighting that the girls sound as fresh (and yes, “fragile”) in English as they do French.
Ultimately this is an album chock full of songs about love, life, heartbreak. At times intimate and introverted (“Mappemonde”), others bold and extrovert (“Ôte-moi mon linge”), sometimes almost downright danceable – certainly in a toe-tapping kind of way (“Par Le Chignon de Cou”). All with faintest of country-folk tinges that makes you yearn for the ruggedness of the Atlantic coastline.
It’s March and already I have a pretty good idea as to my album of the year 2013. Check it out for yourselves as it can be streamed here – until the album’s official release.
Les Soeurs Boulay – Par le chignon de cou
Apollinaire’s Pink Hotel
The 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
The 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
New April March song (and album coming up!)
Whoa!
Whoa!
Whoa!
See here!
Rose
The other big release this week, together with Albin de la Simone’s album, is Keren Rose Melouls third offering. Et Puis Juin is Rose’s follow-up since 2009’s Les souvenirs sous ma frange. It’s exactly what you expect it to be, breezy, soft-sighing, plonky songs sung with an airy voice, just the way you like it. Berry is the best reference. Rose adds a very nice song about Paris to a long list of songs bout the City of Light. It sounds a bit like a track Gainsbourg could’ve written for Isabelle Adjani, with less provocative lyrics. See the video for the title track here.
Rose – Jamais Paris ne me laisse
Albin de la Simone, Emiliana Torrini
Maybe one of the most underrated new chansonniers from France is Albin de la Simone. He worked with/for Jeanne Cherhal and Vanessa Paradis (they duetted as well) and for the Vie héroique-movie, his fourth album was just released but he’s not quite a household name. Un homme is a very delicate and delicious album. Alain Souchon gets mentioned a lot in reviews as a reference, AdlS writes melancholic songs with big arrangements, sings with an unsteady yet deteremined voice and aims for the heart and soul. On this new album, he duets with the lovely Icelandic singer Emiliana Torrini.
Albin de la Simone & Emiliana Torrini – Moi, moi
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.
Cowhand from Quebec
A 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