At about 4 p.m. yesterday afternoon I fell into listening to my Serge Gainsbourg collection. I have no idea why. It just happened. Gainsbourg was a French pop singer-songwriter with a deep, seductive masculine voice and gritty look. His music was eccentric and edgy, and themes ranged from the tragic to the comic. His many public relationships, often with younger women, kept him ageless and egotistical.
What makes Gainsbourg's compositions and delivery so interesting, in addition to the sound of his voice, is how often his style changed. What begins as chanson-pop morphs into Franco-rock in the '60s and then erotic pop in the '70s and beyond. Jazz and Caribbean riffs and rhythms often were mixed in. His music remains quirky and never dull. Titles of his songs include Initials B.B. (for Brigitte Bardot), Bonnie and Clyde, Ford Mustang and Lemon Incest.
Later in life, alcohol caught up with Gainsbourg, often on television and particularly when he was a guest on variety shows with attractive female stars from France and the U.S. After his death in 1991, many of his songs were remixed by European disc jokeys, giving his seductive music and records a new life.
Here's Gainsbourg in 1960 singing his L'eau a la Bouche (Mouth Watering):
JazzWax tracks: There are several excellent compilations of Serge Gainsbourg's recordings. Among the best are Gainsbourg... Foreverhere (a two-CD set), and Love and the Beathere, though there may be some overlap.
PS: Catch my review in today's Wall Street Journal of the Bo-Keys new CD, Got to Get Back, which is available next Tuesday (go here). I will be posting about the album next week when you can buy it.
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://www.typepad.com/services/trackback/6a00e008dca1f0883401538f3d0b21970b
The thing which is not immediately obvious to non-French speakers is the stunning lyrics, which were always firmly tongue-in-cheek. The double entendres, puns and sub text were always hilarious or - when he sang with his daughter - totally unPC. An amazing character.
No upSerge in interest registering here aside from the unPC question, Did SG help create the concept of EuroTrash? The Bo-Keys sound beaucoup better, with a great cast of character-included musicians participating.
But there's a confusing sentence in your WSJ preview when you mention guests involved, the sentence stating something like "the blues harp player Charlie Musselwhite who also plays blues harp." Could just be a careless proofreader, but it might instead indicate that the last five words belong elsewhere, attached to another blues harp player. I'm wondering which and/or who.
Addendum -- If you want to see and hear him as a quite talented jazz pianist, I'd recommend you dig Serge's version of a famous, if not *the* most famous, of at least one of the mostly played of all jazz standards:
Gainsbourg is considered by many to be a big joke -- his "hipness" an embarassing affectation. He is hip to, perhaps, someone who stopped thinking around 1973 imho.
And you wrote about Gainsbourg without mentioning "Je T'aime" and Jane Birkin? That puts the start of his 'erotic' pop back to the late 60s (he actually recorded it with Bardot in '67, but complications ensued and his '69 version with Birkin came out 15 years before the Bardot version). Certainly not the first record banned from radio play, but quite notorious and maybe the first to actually carry a 'parental warning' in many countries.
The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.
As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.
Marc Myers writes frequently on music and the arts for the Wall Street Journal. He is author of "Why Jazz Happened" (University of California Press). In 2012, JazzWax was named the Jazz Journalists Association's "Blog of the Year."
And we musn't forget the importance of one his arrangers (for Melody Nelson among other albums) and sometime ghost composer: Jean-Claude VANNIER.
Posted by: Jean-François PITET | June 17, 2011 at 03:32 AM
The thing which is not immediately obvious to non-French speakers is the stunning lyrics, which were always firmly tongue-in-cheek. The double entendres, puns and sub text were always hilarious or - when he sang with his daughter - totally unPC. An amazing character.
Posted by: Michael A-Lyric | June 17, 2011 at 05:35 AM
I'm not sure SG was really "unPC" , Provocative and troublemaker of course but unPC?
Posted by: jp gelbon | June 17, 2011 at 07:01 AM
No upSerge in interest registering here aside from the unPC question, Did SG help create the concept of EuroTrash? The Bo-Keys sound beaucoup better, with a great cast of character-included musicians participating.
But there's a confusing sentence in your WSJ preview when you mention guests involved, the sentence stating something like "the blues harp player Charlie Musselwhite who also plays blues harp." Could just be a careless proofreader, but it might instead indicate that the last five words belong elsewhere, attached to another blues harp player. I'm wondering which and/or who.
Posted by: Ed Leimbacher | June 17, 2011 at 01:02 PM
Serge, oui, un enfant terrible, une hot caractère extraordinaire, quite hip too.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QKfBJMIANsM
He was loved by many, as he was hated by others. A real artiste e une bon vivant.
Posted by: Brew | June 17, 2011 at 09:20 PM
A complete Artist
Posted by: Ray | June 18, 2011 at 04:09 AM
Addendum -- If you want to see and hear him as a quite talented jazz pianist, I'd recommend you dig Serge's version of a famous, if not *the* most famous, of at least one of the mostly played of all jazz standards:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iSA8wIGaENA
Posted by: Brew | June 18, 2011 at 08:25 AM
Gainsbourg is considered by many to be a big joke -- his "hipness" an embarassing affectation. He is hip to, perhaps, someone who stopped thinking around 1973 imho.
Thanks for a great article nevertheless.
Posted by: Walt Gauchel | June 18, 2011 at 03:54 PM
And you wrote about Gainsbourg without mentioning "Je T'aime" and Jane Birkin? That puts the start of his 'erotic' pop back to the late 60s (he actually recorded it with Bardot in '67, but complications ensued and his '69 version with Birkin came out 15 years before the Bardot version). Certainly not the first record banned from radio play, but quite notorious and maybe the first to actually carry a 'parental warning' in many countries.
Posted by: SJ | June 18, 2011 at 04:41 PM
Hip to the max. And lotsa eyecandy too.
Posted by: mpn1jco | June 19, 2011 at 07:21 AM