Nice, if maybe a little too fast bar-jazz-trio version of the maybe coolest composition of the Gainsbourg repertoire by Sao-Paulo-based Les Serges. Wow bassman!
Victoires de la musique (2)
Yesterday, the remaining Victoires de la musique were presented. Among the winners were ZAZ (see video), who was celebrated on this blog many times, and Yael Naim. Full list of winners here.
Jenifer
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
Initials SG
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
Dead Beats and a Sad Tomato
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
More Gainsbourg tributes
Michel Drucker, he of the infamous Whitney Houston-incident, hosted another great Gainsbourg-tribute on French tv recently. Featuring Benjamin Biolay (singing Sorry Angel, see above), Elodie Frégé & Stanislas channeling Serge & Catherine (very sexy!), Claire Keim singing La ballade de Johnny Jane, it’s overwhelming. Nice mini-docu’s too, this one, and this one. (thanks Sami)
Taratata celebrates Gainsbourg
Yesterday, the French music show Taratata was dedicated to Gainsbourg (because of the 20th anniversary of his death, on March 2). Nosfell and Laetitia Casta singing La decadanse, Charlotte covering Couleur Café, Ben L’Oncle Soul & Sly Johnson redoing the Vieille Canaille-duet… overwhelmingly beautiful! See the emission HERE. Youtube-clips HERE and HERE.
Jane Birkin & The Lilies
A few quotes from reviews of We Are The Lilies:’A collaboration between Sérgio Dias, founder of cult 1960s/70s Brazilian psychedelic group Os Mutantes, and French indie outfit Tahiti Boy and The Palmtree Family. Written and recorded in five days, their album is a blast, blending the French band’s twisty, intricate pop with Dias’s free-wheeling tropicalia. Jane Birkin and Iggy Pop, an apt mix of sophistication and wildness, pop up as guest vocalists.’ (FT)
‘Sounding every bit like a vintage Trevor Horn production, with beautifully descending Belle and Sebastian chords, raucous shout-alongs comparable to early Bees and some hysterical saxophones straight out of the Ian Dury catalogue, this is a slightly woozy house party album for when LSD gets in the punchbowl and revellers start getting into the first phases of debauched undress.’ (BBC)
‘The two big moments on We Are the Lilies come courtesy of special guests Iggy Pop and Jane Birkin (the actress/ singer most famous for her recordings with ex-husband Serge Gainsbourg), and both are most unexpected. The Iggy-assisted “Why?” is great fun, but almost only because he seems be having most of it (“Why do the French smoke? Why do Americans fight? Why do Brazilians dance?” he yelps over a spotty appropriation of a little Motor City rumble). Birkin’s “Marie” fares better with its stripped-down approach, channeling Blue-era Joni Mitchell with a bit of that perfectly flat-but-pretty French affectation.’ (Pitchfork)
The Lilies feat. Jane Birkin – Marie
Erin Ivey
Norah Jones’ sexy sister with a reggae beat. Intrigued? Erin Ivey is from Austin, Texas, a town brimming with singer-songwriters, but she stands out. With her looks (she was voted one of Austins most beautiful women), with her husky voice that makes ice melt, with her band (organ based R&B/dub trio the Finest Kind), with fine lyrics and with solid songs. And, you guessed it, a wee bit of French singing. In Chocolate, she quotes from Marie Laforet’s Mon Amour, Mon Ami. I’m listening to Erins album Broken Gold, that’s just out, and three songs in I want me and the mrs to slip in something more comfortable. See Erin perform the song before a very unappreciative audience. [Thanks Cameron]