Yelle‘s new album is out now, featuring the great singles La Musique and Que veux-tu (both remixed to further brilliance, go here to listen). It’s even more 80s than the now classic debut, though no covers. As far as I know. Mon Pays, that sounds something straight out of the Vince Clarke vault of never-before released gems, is my fave from the album.
Yelle – Mon pays
Guestpost! Adrian of DCR on Arnaud Fleurent-Didier:
The worst interview I ever did was with a famous US comedienne who, at the time, was huge in the UK. It was over the phone and she was talking on a mobile, in the back of a car, being driven to a concert somewhere on Britain’s motorway network. It was terrible. Every other sentence was lost in a haze of horrific static and buzzing. I managed to salvage a piece out of it but, really, it was awful.
French pop star Arnaud Fleurent-Didier had warned me that his phone line was ”a bit noisy”, but I wasn’t really prepared for the sound of a swarm of bees that hit when I called him. But whereas other interviewees might have shrugged and said ‘forget about it’, he legged it along the road, found a landline and called me back. And all this the evening before he was due to fly to China for a fortnight of shows. Chapeau!
He turned out to be an engaging interviewee. Speaking in English, he talked about playing in China to Chinese people, rather than to an audience of French expats (“that would be terrible!”), playing all the instruments on his most recent album La Reproduction himself (“apart from the flute”) and the trouble you encounter by having a beautiful woman as a drummer.
You can listen to the whole interview in You and the Night and the Music on Different Class Radio.
Arnaud Fleurent-Didier – France Culture
Don’t you just love sexy French vocals over chilled electro-beats? Jaime (who looks like the lovechild of Ron Maell and Boris Blank) and the superlovely Patricia of Souvenir made a new album, and they’re serving just that: husky female sighing over robotic music. Travelogues features English and French songs, music-wise it’s a little rougher (colder, if you like) ’round the edges. Lo-fi Italo, if that’s possible. Music for sunglasses at night.
Souvenir – Coup de coeur
Peter Peter is a Montreal-based singer-songwriter who just released his first album, Homonyme. An interesting album, with some post-rock elements (he worked with a producer who also worked with Godspeed You! Black Emperor), nice ballads, subtle electronica and, more importantly, a duet with Coeur de Pirate. In French, yay! There’s another song with female backing-vocals, but my guess is this isn’t our Béatrice.
Peter Peter & Coeur de Pirate – Tergiverse
The interesting part about the anniversary edition of Gainsbourg’s Intégrale box, is that it the title Intégrale is nowhere to be found. Only if you want to order it, you see the title. And then you can read the quite unfavourable reviews. The critique focusses on the omittance of songs like La Noyée and Le sable & le soldat, and the umpteenth rehashing of old material that every SG-fan already has on their treasured albums and earlier compilations. Understandable. How many SG-novices will buy a 160 euro box with 20 cds? Why omit songs that were on earlier compilations? Why is the personnel of later albums mentioned, but not the players on Serge’s first EPs? I got my box yesterday and I have to say I’m quite pleased with it. I think it looks good, I like the pictures and it has several songs I’d never heard: like the Les Papillons Noirs-duet with Bijou, some instrumentals and full version of Je suis venu te dire. Now, just who is that at the very end of the song? (It’s Jane Birkin, saying ‘Ah bien là, je peux pas faire plus que ça’, or ‘Hold it, I can’t go on anymore’) (Thanks Pierre)
There’s no obligation to buy. The stuff that you don’t have, will no doubt turn up on the internet. But the feeling to open up this box, see 20 cd’s, see the photos, flip through the booklet (all text in French, another mistake), I like how that makes me feel.
Serge Gainsbourg – Je suis venu te dire que je m’en vais (full version)
Serge Gainsbourg – Je ne t’aime plus moi aussi (instrumental) (Is it me, or does this one sound more like Je suis venu te dire?)
In other news, I made a podcast for KX Radio with all kinds of Serge-tracks. Go HERE
Ma place is the very pretty, elegant new single by Liege-based singer Sophie Galet. Her new (second) album Stella Polaris will be released in October. Download for free in exchange of your email-adress. HERE.
Because I like girls who look a bit like Alyssa Milano. And because it’s a very catchy song. That’s why I post this video, and this track by Jenifer.
Jenifer – Je danse
Re-up of the Gainsbourg-mix I made earlier, because on March 2 we’ll remember Serge’s passing, 20 years ago. That said, I guess I see y’all this Wednesday in Club Bitterzoet in Amsterdam for the Gitanes & Jazz-soirée? Or maybe you’ll go to Ruimte X in Tilburg on March 5 (I won’t be there), or Petrol in Antwerp on March 12 (I’m there, oh boy, I’m there)?
Download the mix from HERE.
Illustration stolen from HERE
Tracklist:
Serge – Folk Implosion
Chatterton – Seu Jorge
Couleur Café – Babaloo
Les Sambassadeurs – Serge Gainsbourg
La Javanaise – Richard Galliano
Jane B – Sandie//Trash
5:55 – Charlotte Gainsbourg
L’Anamour – Ivy
Harley Davidson – Souvenir
Laisse Tomber les Filles – Mareva Galanter
Je t’aime Moi Non Plus – The Traces
The Ticket Puncher – Mick Harvey
Fuir le Bonheur – Ariane Moffatt
En Melody – Kahimi Karie
Initials BB – David Shea
Les Petits Papiers – Jane Birkin & Françoise Hardy
This wednesday, France Inter has a great evening planned about Gainsbourg with covers by BB Brunes and Joseph D’Anvers, plus a dj-mix by Gilles Peterson
On the cover of her brand new album 101, Keren Ann tries to sell us a tough babe royale with cheese, Honey Bunny style, but actually, the box contains just dead beats and a sad tomato. Nine years ago, the forlorn princess of her nouvelle chanson debut La Disparition told an exceptionally seductive story of longing and melancholia – high in the ranks of FS’s best-of-the-decade albums, and rightly so –, and maybe it was nowhere to go but down from there. While 07’s Lay Your Head Down already was a huge disappointment, 101, also English lyrics only, finally comes as a lesson in artistic rigour and negative energy, oscillating indecisively between neo folk and a pale silhouette of 90s dream pop: half of the tracks – sounding like a portable pulled out of a swamp – are oppressively boring Hope Sandoval copies, the uptempo songs indie pop bubblegum of the shallowest kind, while the title tune offers a bromidic 5:30 min loop that only serves to induce chronic fatigue syndrome, but fast. The limp vegetable is Keren Ann herself. Confusing intimacy with ennui, the royalty of yore has a new title: tristesse drama queen of the year.
Keren Ann – She Won’t Trade It for Nothing