The Smiley Smile Message Board

I'm getting more and more into his work, mostly his later concept LPs. Singular (some might say sick, can't hedonistic thrills be art too?) talent and one of the finest French artists, along with Johnny Hallyday.

For those who only know "Je T'aime...Moi Non Plus",  there is MUCH more to Gainsbourg than his lone American chart entry.

As one of the two (?) resident Frogs here, I can totally get behind where you're at with this one, dude-man.

Try "The Ballad of Melody Nelson", a short concept album (really a short story set to music) that sounds like nothing else. Even if you don't understand his smoky Gauloise drawl, you'll get off on the mood and the music. The story is about sex with a schoolgirl, a preoccupation of his shared by a few other "rock luminaries", let's not forget.

He's much-loved here in France - the original "bad boy" who said what everyone was thinking, while smoking and drinking his way to death (so you don't have to). There's a famous clip that gets shown regularly on French TV, of him telling Whitney Houston, live on a primetime TV chat show - "I want to f  u  c  k you." In very clear English, which he repeated. Whitney was, to her credit, pleasurably outraged, Serge totally out of his (and Whitney's, I imagine) box.

Listened to The Ballad Of Melody Nelson, what an outrageous album. How controversial was that album when it came out? I've translated some of the lyrics, and they're quite shocking (by today's standards, and I'm only 21).

What kind of controversy did Serge run into in France?

Oh please let's not have this thread make a beeline for the bottom of the page.

What kind of controversy?

Actually, very little. the French are very tolerant of what they see as "artistic excess" - Serge was much-loved, and more loved the worse he got. He went too far (unforgiveably) when he recorded a song to the joys of incest, featuring his daughter Charlotte in the video. It traumatised her. His video for (I think) "My Légionnaire" feature very dodgy footage of a very pretty young boy. Astonishingly, these were both hits. He became more attractive to women the uglier he became (really, excess suited him - as a young man he was gawky and nerdy), and had relationships with the most beautiful women in France (and therefore, folks, the world) including, of course, Jane Birkin. He frequently appeared and performed drunk and/or stoned, and his recorded legacy is astonishingly varied (he loved African and reggae music), but I'm afraid you're flogging a dead horse by trying to build a thread around him here. Americans (mostly) don't want to listen to someone singing in a foreign language (ie a language they don't understand). Especially French. It's your loss, America!

Ian likes him, maybe he'll chime in.

Well, isn't is all art pretty hedonistic?  Besides -- you know tons of people here love Prince.


I don't know man, Oasis are pretty popular around here.

Seriously, Serge Gainsbourg is so trendy among music fans.  You can't seriously think no one likes him here.

Also, that song he did about incest was pretty good.  Perhaps...paradise.

Just being provocative. If it saves this thread from falling off into cyberspace.

(Nice line about Oasis, btw)

Thanks.  And I get that too -- this should be a cool thread, hopefully people do participate.  I've heard Serge but don't own anything.  Is his stuff easy to find on vinyl?

Even in France, his vinyl is fairly scarce. And pricey. Strange thing about French recordings; they never seem to press anything in great quantity, and don't bother when it goes out of stock. Just give a Gallic shrug and wait for the next one. I also like L'Affaire Louis Trio, Les Innocents, and Vanessa Paradis, but finding out-of-print recordings (CD or vinyl) is oddly difficult. F'rinstance, the first Mellow CD was almost impossible to find on release, and disappeared in a flash. Bizarre. There are exceptions - the vast legion of "pretty boy" male singer-songwriters always fills the boxes at car boot sales.

Ballade De Melody Nelson is nothing, outrage-wise, in comparison to later stuff.
My lord, the man did an entire concept album about the sexual pleasures of farting and shitting. He was kind of the French Zappa, just far more subversive, shocking and intelligent.

Mieux vaut tard que jamais. I finally see this thread. Salut dogbeath!

Controversy? Shane McGowan eat your heart out, we had Serge way before.

Achem he did burn real money on TV


AND

heume heume "Aux armes etcaetera".... he did do a reggae version of the French National anthem.

Listen to everything you can lay your hands on.

"Listen to everything you can lay your hands on."

I think that's a quote for our times. Rebienvenue!!!

Geez, sorry for being so "banale", work will do that to you, ya know lol lol lol.

I am jumping the other side of the pond for a few days, after which I have great hopes to find I dont know what back, but it has to do with some modicum  of coherence.

I really love Melody Nelson, I dont give a fucck what it's about.  It's in French baby.

Anybody ever heard Michel Polnareff's "Polnareffs" from 71?

Holy hell, the arrangements are just astounding.  It's a cross between something like Melody Nelson and Bacharach and "What's Going On?".  So much subtlety and beauty.  I poo not.  Seek out a track called "Petite Petite"

Get in touch, zelil! I'd like to listen to you ...

Michel Polnareff,my best of :

Lets see
La Poupée qui fait Non
Dans la Maison Vide
La Michetonneuse
Le Bal des Laze
Love me, please love me
Qui a tué Grand-Maman
Tout tout pour ma chérie   

Polnareff can be really cheesy though

But dont forget Bijou, Jacques Dutronc (La fille du Père Noël), Téléphone, Nino Ferrer

I dont doubt it!  But that one album that I have of his rules.

Dogbreath, how hard is it to find Johnny Hallyday records in France?

I just found a huge bit torrent of Serge, 21 albums. Most all of his released output.

My very first single was Killy Watch by Johnny, twas given to me by my Godmother, I was 3.

Album titles?

In alphabetical order -

Aux Armes Et Caetera
Confidentiel
De Gainsbourg a Gainsbarre
Du Chant a la une
Du Jazz Dans Le Ravin
Gainsbourg Percussions
Histoire De Melody Nelson
Initials B.B.
Jane Birkin - Serge Gainsbourg
Le Cinema de Serge Gainsbourg
L'Etonnant Serge Gainsbourg
L'Homme a Tete De Chou
Love On The Beat
Madame Claude
Mauvaises Nouvelles Des Etoiles
No. 2
No. 4
Rock Around the Bunker
Theatre le Palace '80
Vu de l'Exterieur
You're Under Arrest

Interestingly I was tipped off to investigate Mr. Gainsbourg through the sampling of his work on De La Soul Is Dead; Prince Paul may be a fan, or at the least Serge was something he liked digging through the crates.  I didn't pursue it, partly because of the language barrier, his image and the scarcity of material to be found.  Very interesting though...fresh thread.

That's all his regular albums minus soundtracks, singles and comps.

Just a quick note re. Johnny Halliday - his only English language album, recorded with US musos in the US - is unbelievably good. A genuine tough rock jewel. Sold zilch here, of course, where they could care less about Johnny singing in English, and sold worse in the US, for the same reason. Called "Rough Town", it's kind of River-era Springsteen with a definite Allmans/southern rock n' roll vibe. One or two lighter tracks as singles fodder, but they're pretty neat, too.

His albums are heavily collected in France, mint copies of originals being as highly-priced as you'd hoped they wouldn't be.

Interesting guy - got better as he got older, and he's a long way from being the joke I thought he was when I lived in the UK. He's a genuine star. Absolutely the closest to Elvis, in terms of live charisma and sheer balls, that's still on the planet. He's a bit thick, though, so interviews are inevitably grunt-fests, and has zero taste, so his looks depend on whatever stylist he's using at the time, and boy, he makes us suffer sometimes. Great and undervalued actor, too, especially as he ages.

If you like Gainsbourg I think you should Jacques Brel give a try. I rate him even higher then Gainsbarre!

Anyway, here's some info in English about our Serge:http://www.francevision.com/nsltr/vf14/gains.htm



 

Doesn't he just, but he is a real popular artist, like Piaf was, and amen to your analysis!

Hey! Zelil! Close this window! The boss is coming!

Yes, you're right, that would be me.

Zelil - (to herself) time to check out the SG thread and see if dogbreath is around
Zelil - WHAT! I caught you yet again procrastinating on your deadlines
Zelil - stop giving a bad conscience
Zelil - WORK, you lazy sod, and close that window at once!
Zelil - OK Boss!

poof she's gone!

Ian, I dig your comment about Serge being a better Zappa than Zappa was. Kudos, friend.

Serge a better Zappa than Zappa?

SG was a completely insular hedonist and serial drug abuser. Zappa deplored musicians getting out of their heads, and his drug of choice was tobacco. Zappa was a band-leader, always, Serge never. Zappa lived in the studio and touring on the road, Serge lived in bars and beds. Zappa was a studio perfectionist and virtuoso musician, Serge couldn't give a fucck.

If you want to measure them in terms of public outrage, I don't think either of them was perticularly "offensive" (whatever). Zappa shot his mouth off to his own semi-political agenda, Serge got drunk and swore. Neither exactly made the walls of the city shake with their revolutionary posture; Serge was loved for it, Zappa largely ignored (at least by the people he wanted to affect).

So I don't get the Zappa/Ganisbourg connection, is what I'm saying: worth taking further?

I’ve got the “Comic Strip” compilation and “Melody Nelson”, I like it, but it’s also very theatrical, very campy, very french. “Melody Nelson” relies just as much on the moods and arrangements plus Gainsbourg’s own “star quality”, as he talks over the tracks, rather than actual songs. But as a nihilistic popmusician, I guess he couldn‘t be bothered. Really an example of the singer/speaker not the song. I wonder if the rest of his records are like that.
Also heard some of the stuff he did with Brigitte Bardot like “Bubble Gum“, “Comic Strip”, “Harly Davidson”, “Contact”. Sounds like an example of french pop music, trying to come to terms with the ever-pervading american popmusic and american cultural pehenomena.
Best is “Comic Strip”. “Harley Davidson” sounds like his version of “Leader Of The Pack”. ”Contact” sounds pretty modern, but also like a kind of oldfashioned concept of what is modern-sounding , a little like Esquivel.
He should have worked with Nico, instead of the little girls he preferred. Maybe they could have done a duet of  “Requiem Pour Un Con”. I wonder what that would have been like, two nihilists fighting over nothing in a recording studio?

Søren

Initials B.B. is one of my favourite albums ever. I like Melody Nelson too, but I prefer the fun aspect of BB. Great party album, actually. Comic Strip and Ford Mustang rock.

It's a shame that one of his greatest qualities - superb lyricist - isn't going to register with non-French speakers.

He wrote a late-sixties' hit for France Gall (sp? Zelil?) called "Sucette" (lollipop) which is, perhaps unsurprisingly, all about giving blowjobs - fairly explicitly. The great joke was that Ms. Gall, a particularly dim example of manufactured French popstarlet, wasn't in on the joke when she recorded it (nor, apparently, for some time after). So there was this innocent blonde la-la-la-ing a nagging piece of pop fluff all about oral sex on the TV ...

(Waits for corrections from Zelil ...)

Yeah, he sounds like a bad boy, I guess he liked to "dirty up" innocent looking young french starlets.

Søren

"I guess he liked to "dirty up" innocent looking young french starlets."

Yes, he was a manipulating and often cruel man. The Vanessa Paradis album he wrote lyrics for ("Variations ...") is a great album. She was more than a match for him, too, and far from the Lolita figure he thought he could control ... "Paradis," he said, "c'est l'enfer" (Paradis(e) is hell).

'

It seems he also liked to stage himself in a "beauty and beast" setting, with Brigitte Bardot  and Jane Birkin, I don't know, maybe it's a classic female-male setting. As for Vanessa Paradis, she's very cute and funny, I saw her in a "Girl On The Bridge" with Daniel Auteuil, where it seems that the "beauty and beast" or "father/daugter" theme is replayed.

Søren

OK, how about this:

SERGE IS BETTER THAN ZAPPA. DEAL WITH IT.

Deal with it.

One of those phrases that just leaves me ... strangely unmoved. Deal with it yourself, thank you!

I don't give a sh*t, really, what you think. Deal with it.

Yawns, stretches ... watches fly crawling across wall.

You forgot *shits adult diaper*.

Sorry. My bad.

*merdas adult diaper*

HAHA!
Anyway, all I was doing was pointing out similarities in subject matter in Serge and Zappa.
Really, a closer parallel to Zappa is Jan Berry.

See my last response in the BFS thread, dewd ... I'm Audi!

*sigh*

deeeeeeeaaaaaalllllll wwwwiiiiiiiiiittttthhhhhhhhhhh iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiizzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.....

I'm really digging this thread, especially dogbreath's comments.

Got Serge's Vu de L'exterieur on now.

*sigh*

Now it's Evguenie Sokolov, the track with the fart noises.

Fuckin' BUMP!

Serge's thread is too good to hit the bottom of the forum.

Guys, what do you all think of Serge's jazz material?

CHEZ COOL!

I feel two ways about it. I love the fact that his later work is so decadent and disgusting, the jazz sides just seem more restrained.

BTW, what instrument is Serge playing for these jazz sides? AMG says he played guitar and piano.

Yeah, the French trip is always comparatively restrained, that's part of their coolness. Over on this continent, we tend to see jazz as more of a let-it-all-hang-out thing. But Serge did that genre in the same way as his other work, in a detached and tongue-in-cheek manner. In some ways, I see him as a French Mose Allison. Not my favorite stuff, but damn groovy. I see him playing piano on that stuff, but mainly just digging and directing the scene.

It's very interesting jazz, Ian, a little bit of cabaret and lots of French-ness. Good dinner music (provided you're at a good restaurant).

Gainsbourg Percussions is an awesome album.

Yep, that's my favorite album from that period, as well. He was pretty ahead of his time, incorporating African rhythms like that, into a cool world-beat daddy-o stew.

That's something I notice that's been underrated about Serge and his use of rhythms. Especially on his reggae albums, he had a keen sense of rhythm. Lyrics aside, the man was a consumate musician. Lots of clever touches in his music.

YES! That's why Portishead-type musicians and hip-hop people get into him. Have you ever noticed the similarities between him and Isaac Hayes? They are scarily numerous.

EXACTLY! I agree wholeheartedly. I see the Isaac Hayes comparison, especially as far as the rhythms are concerned. I wonder if Serge was a taskmaster, considering how tight his music is rhythmically and instrumentally.

I think he was probably pretty harsh on stodgy studio musicians, but the circles he ran in were pretty stoned, from jazz cats to psych musicians to reggae mons. I think that's where Serge's head was at naturally, so he sought those people out, because they were on the same hypnotised wavelength.

I always thought that was so amazing about Serge, he was born in 1928 and in the late 50s, early 60s he was doing his jazz music. That fit in with his age group. I'm sure there were other people around his age, early 30s, playing jazz around that time. Then in the late 60s, nearing his forties, he gets a little more rock 'n roll and R&B. Most of the rock 'n rollers around that era, even in France, were in their mid to late 20s. Either it was trendy or there was a method to the madness. Then of course in the 70s and early 80s he went reggae in his early 50s. Then nearing 60 he did 80s pop better than most. The fact that his music always evolved and changed with the times just seems to add to his hipness. He was a hip jazz man, awesome popster, one of a kind reggae maestro, and synth funk genius. That's just awesome, man.

I know, man. The wild thing is that we can, and do, draw strong comparisons between Serge and such seemingly disparate musicians as Isaac Hayes, Scott Walker, Bryan Ferry, Frank Zappa and, yes, Jan Berry (another incredible arranger-artist-genre-stomper, and Jill Gibson was his Bardot-Birkin), and still remain on the mark. The 'Bourg encompasses all that and more. His status as a formerly fad-popular zany French dude is criminal. It's language-prejudice, plain and simple. He belongs in the top echelon, period.

I don't see what there is to dislike about Serge. There's something for everybody in his music. The language barrier never bothered me with him, nor did the fact that he rapped a good portion of his later material (I wonder how many packs a day Serge went through). Great music transcends languages and cultures. There's something to like about Serge if you're 18 or 80.

I don't see that anyone dislikes Serge, they just ignore and pigeonhole him, which is a far more sinister and insulting fate.

Well I guess it takes a certain hipness to discover artists of the quality (and country) of Serge, especially for us who don't speak the language. I found Serge on the All Music Guide because I was looking up foreign language rockers, having gone through Os Mutantes (a band you MUST check out, Ian) and expressing interest in We All Together. His styles listed were "Cabaret", "French Pop", "Foreign Language Rock", "Baroque Pop", "French Rock", and "Jazz-Pop". Just by reading those styles I got an idea how diverse the man's music was, even before any serious listening. The omission of a reggae tag was baffling when I began listening to all this reggae music bearing Serge's name.

Serge most likely is a highly revered cult figure here in the States, but as our French friends here can attest, he must be of a god-like stature in France and French-speaking territories. I know I will do my part to turn as many people onto Serge as I can.

We should invite that elusive goddess Daniele in to add to this thread, on the French-status score.
Daniele...come to us.

I think you and I are the only ones who care about this thread anymore, man.

Listening to No. 2 now. Enjoying every second of it.

We'll bring 'em in, sooner or later!
2 is great, too! I'm gonna listen now, too.

Ian, can you PM me a copy of Evguenie Sokolov? My copy is corrupted for some reason.

Definitely. I'll rip it.

Your copy has the fart noises, right?

On a related note, his daughter Charlotte is hot.

Hell yes. Lemon Incest, indeed.

No. 4 is spinning now. More cool jazz from a cool cat.

What about Serge's reggae material, Ian? What do you think of that?

I love it. Unceasingly, unhesitatingly and everlastingly.

Hey, I care, I'm just jet lagged, I was visiting your country for a few days. So I'll get back on plus I'm trying to get my avatar sorted and am not thinking straight.

Call me crazy, but I enjoy Serge's reggae more than Bob Marley's. And I adore Marley's. Serge may have been one of the whitest men to ever cut a side, but man he knew the music.

Where were you??

Surely you are getting carried away. Didn't he play with Wailers at one point?

Søren

I know he used Rita Marley on one of his albums, had her sing some appropriately sexual lyrics, which the husband did not approve of.

Ian, what do you think of Love On The Beat and You're Under Arrest?

I love em, very Waits-Cohen (and Walker-Ferry) to my ears, just far more dangerously deranged and sleazy.

I think they're among some of his classiest (if such a word could be used for Serge) work. Never mind the fact that he doesn't sing a word of the material (wouldn't that make them rap albums?).

"Lemon Incest" is still shocking to me, even after a ton of listens.

I know, that's a truly cracked, disturbing and fabulous track. Have you seen the video?

No, but I've read all the stories. Is there a way to see it?

I'll try to rip my DVD.

DVD?! Can you hook a brother up?

I haven't figured out how to dub off a DVD yet! But I will over the weekend.
The DVD set is incredible, it has tons of stuff, including the entire Melody Nelson TV special.

Can you buy this DVD?

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0009WGTJK/102-7220832-7995366?v=glance&n=130

How many discs is it?

2 full discs. In-foda-valuable.

Ordering now.

Ian, did you get my last PM?

Checking now. Gotcha.

Ian, my copy of Du Chant A La Une has some live bonus tracks - do you have these? I can hook you up if you don't.

And I've just acquired what seems to be a bootleg of unreleased material. Any interest in this stuff?

DEFINITELY!

A cursory listen reveals that it's a lot of fragments and live performances. Some unreleased songs. Interesting stuff.

this is a great thread.  Gosh, I didn't know there was such a body of work associated with Gainsbourg.

Could you post a tracklist for this one, please. I am interested.

She wouldn't talk to him for years after he told the thruth on a TV show.  I think she even stopped her career for a while.

Some three or four years later he wrote another song for her: 'Les ballons' (The balloons). She recorded it and it was relased as a single.
Then he revealed that the original title was 'Les tettons' (The tits)!

The aforementioned "Polnareff's" is way better than pretty much anything Serge recorded, on a musical level at least. A truly astounding record, your education in French pop (or music in general, if I'm to be honest) is incomplete without it.
Jonathan, you should investigate the rest of Michel P's music (at least his 60s-early 70s output) immediately!

Thanks Harvey!
I find it to be absolutely breath-taking indeed.   "Petite Petite" in itself is one of the greatest songs ever written.  The arrangement and vocals are absolutely thrilling--on par or greater than Bacharach.

The thing I love most about Polnareff's is its total waywardness; leaping from aching romanticism to all-out pop onslaught to breakbeat ultra-funk in the space of a breath. Actually, I lie. The thing I love most about Polnareff's is its complete love of melody. I can't think of a more tune-driven LP (perhaps I'll forget about "Hey You Woman").
In this age where any loner folk-singer-songwriter, any forgotten 60s psych-ster is reissued with a "lost classic" tag, it truly baffles me why this album isn't held in higher regard by the pop cognoscenti. I love Serge, I really do, but in all honesty Polnareff's makes Melody Nelson look half-baked.

My disc doesn't have any artwork with it. I don't know any track titles.

Jonathan, there's so much to Gainsbourg, man. Between his pop material to his jazz material to his reggae, the man seemingly did everything. Just like the Beach Boys.

I couldn't disagree more.

I'm with Ian. Unflinchingly. Serge is THE giant of French pop, in my opinion.

Comparing Polnareff to Gainsbourg is like comparing Bacharach to Zappa. The only reason people compare them is because they're French. Ridiculous.

Ian, did you want me to hook you up with those tracks?

Yeah, man! Let's PM dis.

Ian, did you know that there are double disc versions of Aux Armes Et Caetera and Mauvaises Nouvelles Des Etoiles available? They have tons of remixes, but the problem is that the albums themselves are remixed. They all sound different. What a rip, man.

Yep, similar situation to the Who. Wow, I get a bunch of killer outtakes, but I don't get the original album the way it was meant to be heard? Great.

I'll probably end up buying them just to be "complete", but Evguenie Sokolov without the fart noises is a scary thought. The fart noises make the song, in my opinion.

Making Serge PC by removing "objectionable" elements, even in a bonus-track fashion, is offensive and maddening.

EXACTLY! It's compromising the integrity of the man's work. Those fart noises were what the man intended, can't his wishes be respected by the staff who put out these atrocities?

Ridiculous indeed. However, I wasn't comparing the two artists, just saying I preferred one artist's work to the other's. Even so, I'd say "Polnareff's" and "Melody Nelson" were fairly comparable, as they were released within a few weeks of each other, both are (partly-autobiographical?) concept albums, and both uniquely "French" records. Admittedly the two LPs sound very different, but c'mon, French culture -particularly pop culture- is unlike any other; of course French artists can be compared with each other.
Have you heard "Polnareff's"? Or, eg "Le Bal Des Laze" Ian? If not, you really ought to.

I've heard those, Harvey. Great stuff.

Now that's weird. When I type "a u t o b i o g r a p h i c a l", it's displayed as "autocadelaical". What on earth...?

Damn you, filter!

Kidding.

Listening to Rock Around The Bunker now. Probably Serge's best, in my opinion.

I love that damn album.

That album is so intelligent and so biting, I can't help but love it. AMG called it an "acerbic reclamation of a Jew's own humanity". Very good description.

In one of the most subversive careers in music history, THE most subversive move. "Nazi Rock", I mean come on. Only Steely Dan were more dangerous, IMO.

I don't know what was more subversive on Serge's part, doing an album lashing out at the Nazis or doing an album about the life of a serial killer. Or even "Lemon Incest". Sure does make "Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus" seem tame by comparison.

Not to mention a concept LP about the joys of sex/merdaing/farting.
And a songcycle about an underage groupiegirl.
See the Je T'aime movie he directed. Wow.

What's the deal with that movie, Ian? I've heard so much about it, but can't find it available to buy.

http://www.ioffer.com/i/Je-T-aime-Moi-Non-Plus-1976-Joe-Dallesandro-Gainsbourg-6714824

Interesting. The album for that movie sells on Amazon for over $50, must be only a few copies left unsold in this world.

The film he scored with Anna Karina, Anna, is amazing too.

I gotta see some of these movies he did, man. I heard the soundtrack to Anna was something ELSE.

Ian, do you have the 3 disc set of Serge's soundtrack work?

I have the separate CD's.
Check this out from the Anna soundtrack. Anna Karina singing Rollergirl. I used to have a band called Rollergirl and I used this cut, in it's entirety, as entrance music for our live shows.

http://s23.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=1CQ002EZVCXOE2JC5Z1XR9RW2M

I've heard that! Heard it on a compilation of French rock tracks. Serge features prominently on them.

Ian, what about Initials BB, what do you think of that?

God on wax.

Man I'd kill for some Serge vinyl. Pressings of his stuff must be REALLY hard to find.

Now they are. Thank God I was hipped to him before the trendoid wave of the last 10 or so years. I've managed to keep all the Serge vinyl I acquired cheaply in the early 90's.

How do you like that stuff I sent you, man?

I haven't dug in, yet. I will tonight, brother. Thanks so much.

Ian, how many tracks are on your copy of No. 2?

Lucky 13!

My copy of Initials BB has some bonus remixes, do you have these?

'Sous le soleil exactement' as sung by Anna Karina is my favorite Gainsbourg track.

Does any of you have that album he made with Isabelle Adjani, Pull Marine? I would love to hear that.

I've not heard that album. I can't even lay claim to having heard 90% of the man's work. But I'm working on that. I'm planning on spending $250 for his complete works box set.

Ian, which of Serge's jazz albums is your favorite?

Percussions without a doubt. Love em all, though. The Couleur Cafe comp is maybe the most groovy and listenable in some ways.

You don't have the box set of the complete recordings, do you?

I have a 10-CD set.

This box set I'm referring to has 11 discs, everything he recorded minus the soundtracks, which are anthologized in a separate 3 CD set.

Do you have the Gainsbourg Live album? It's from '85 or '86.

Yeah, that's an amazing one! Love it.

Can you hook me up? I can't find it to buy.

Yep. I'll rip.

I can trade you for a shitload of alternate mixes, mostly from Initials BB.

Wow, my Serge threads on both the Smile Shop and on Shut Down, Vol. 2 died horrible deaths. What kept this one going?!

It's the original. Accept no substitute.

What about those alternate mixes, Ian? Any interest?

yeah, man, absolutely. let me get the live thing for you first.

Cool beans.

Love On The Beat (the song) just registered with me. I always wondered what those screams were, now I know. Love on the "beat".

Just ordered my copy of the Serge box set.

Cool!  ;D

I had my first experience playing Serge for someone other than myself...I played Ballade De Melody Nelson for my father, he expressed interest until I told him what the album was about, at which point he ordered me to turn it off.

If you needed further confirmation of the greatness of Serge, now you have it. Still offensive, well past death.

Good thing I didn't play Vu de l'exterieur for my dad, he probably would have killed me upon finding out what that one was about.

I tried the jazz material on my father, he was considerably more for that. Then I played Rock Around The Bunker for him, which he loved (he hates everything Nazi Germany ever stood for).

I just saw the Serge/Whitney Houston exchange. Classic.

Ian, do you have Theatre le Palace '80?

Bahhhh! Don't leave a brotha hangin'!

Nope, don't have that.
Just watched/DVD's a great documentary on Jane Birkin that had a ton of great Serge/Jane footage.

You want it? Theatre le Palace, that is.

Absolutely, man. You're too cool for school.

Just a point of reference - this is the same show that the single mix of Harley Davidson was taken from.

Do you have Birkin's stuff? That stuff is just as important as his vocal recordings, as he used her as an alter-ego for his more sensitive and emotionally naked material, as I guess he may have felt too embarrassed to sing them himself.

No, I don't have any Birkin stuff. I heard Arabesque, didn't particularly move me. I'm assuming her better days were those where she sang Serge's material. I know the Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin album has some solo stuff of hers, but not much.

That album has her initial EP spread among Serge single/EP tracks.
The Baby Alone In Babylone, Ex-Fan Des Sixties and Amour Des Faintes LP's are 3 of Serge's most important and beautiful records.
I'll hook u up.

There are some Serge singles I need too, man. Can you hook me up with these?

Bonnie And Clyde (English)
Comic Strip (English)
L' Ami Caouette
Le Cadavre Exquis
My Lady Héroine
Trois Millions de Joconde
Sea Sex And Sun (English)
Mister Iceberg
Mister Iceberg (English)
Ces Petits Riens (the duet with Catherine Deneuve)
Souviens-Toi de M'Oublier
Elle Est Si

I'll see what I got, I think I have most of those.

Thanks a million, man, I really appreciate it.

Ian, which is your favorite of Serge's soundtracks? Le Sex-Shop is mine.

Anna!!!!!!!!!

The Serge soundtracks set only features one track from that soundtrack! I feel ripped off.

What the heck???

I'm left of the opinion that not all of Serge's soundtrack work was included on that set, considering there was a whole album for Madame Claude (which I have), and two tracks from said soundtrack are included on the box. Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus had a full album around it as well, as did Anna. What gives, Universal?

Can you give me a tracklist of what you have? The soundtrack thing.

215. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Eau a la Bouche: L'Eau a la Bouche (2:34)
216. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Eau a la Bouche : Angoisse (2:40)
217. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Eau a la Bouche: Black March (1:40)
218. Serge Gainsbourg - Les Loups Dans la Bergerie: Les Loups Dans la Bergerie (Finale) (3:25)
219. Serge Gainsbourg - Les Loups Dans la Bergerie: Cha-Cha-Cha Du Loup (1:34)
220. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Strip-Tease (2:13)
221. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Some Small Chance (2:00)
222. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Rendez-Vous À la Calvados (3:00)
223. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Wake Me At Five (2:48)
224. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Solitude (2:09)
225. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease: Crazy-Horse Swing (2:44)
226. Serge Gainsbourg - Comment Trouvez-Vous Ma Soeur ?: Comment Trouvez-Vous Ma Soeur (2:08)
227. Serge Gainsbourg - Comment Trouvez-Vous Ma Soeur ?: Erotico-Tico (1:27)
228. Serge Gainsbourg - Comment Trouvez-Vous Ma Soeur ?: No Love for Daddy (1:39)
229. Serge Gainsbourg - Comment Trouvez-Vous Ma Soeur ?: Rocking Horse (2:13)
230. Serge Gainsbourg - Vidocq - Chanson du Forçat (2:44)
231. Serge Gainsbourg - Vidocq - Vidocq Flash-Back (3:26)
232. Serge Gainsbourg - Les Coeurs Verts: Scène de Bal 1 (2:13)
233. Serge Gainsbourg - Les Coeurs Verts: Scène de Bal 2 (2:13)
234. Serge Gainsbourg - Le Jardinier D'Argenteuil: Valse Du Jardinier (3:04)
235. Serge Gainsbourg - Anna - Sous Le Soleil Exactement (3:32)
236. Serge Gainsbourg - Toutes Folles de Lui: Caressante (2:21)
237. Serge Gainsbourg - Toutes Folles de Lui: Woom Woom Woom (2:50)
238. Serge Gainsbourg - Si J'Étais un Espion: Breakdown Suite (8:02)
239. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Horizon - Elisa (2:30)
240. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Horizon - L'Horizon (2:13)
241. Serge Gainsbourg - L'Horizon - Elisa (instrumental) (1:39)
242. Serge Gainsbourg - Manon 70 - Manon (2:43)
243. Serge Gainsbourg - Manon 70 - New delire (3:05)
244. Serge Gainsbourg - Ce Sacré Grand-Père - L'Herbe Tendre (2:24)
245. Serge Gainsbourg - Ce Sacré Grand-Père - Ce Sacré Grand-Père (Générique) (2:38)
246. Serge Gainsbourg - Ce Sacré Grand-Père - Champêtre et Pop (2:14)
247. Serge Gainsbourg - Ce Sacré Grand-Père - L'Herbe Tendre (2:18)
248. Serge Gainsbourg - Le Pacha - Requiem pour un Con (2:51)
249. Serge Gainsbourg - Le Pacha - Psychasténie (4:21)
250. Serge Gainsbourg - Le Pacha - Cadavres en Série (1:31)
251. Serge Gainsbourg - Mister Freedom - Oh Beautiful America / Mister Freedom March (2:46)
252. Serge Gainsbourg - Mister Freedom - No No, Yes Yes (2:45)
253. Serge Gainsbourg - Mister Freedom - Freedom Rock / Mister Freedom (2:58)
254. Serge Gainsbourg - Slogan - La Chanson de Slogan (2:52)
255. Serge Gainsbourg - Slogan - Evelyne (2:12)
256. Serge Gainsbourg - La Horse - La Horse (3:37)
257. Serge Gainsbourg - La Horse - L'Alouette (2:29)
258. Serge Gainsbourg - Cannabis - Cannabis (2:29)
259. Serge Gainsbourg - Cannabis - Avant de Mourir (5:23)
260. Serge Gainsbourg - Cannabis - Cannabis (instrumental) (2:27)
261. Serge Gainsbourg - Cannabis - Dernière Blessure (1:24)
262. Serge Gainsbourg - Un Petit Garçon Nommé Charlie Brown - Un Petit Garçon Nommé Charlie Brown (2:42)
263. Serge Gainsbourg - Sex-Shop - Sex-Shop (2:59)
264. Serge Gainsbourg - Sex-Shop - Générique (1:57)
265. Serge Gainsbourg - Sex-Shop - Sex-Radio-Suite (4:41)
266. Serge Gainsbourg - Trop Jolies pour Etre Honnêtes - Moogy-Woogy/Close Combat (3:13)
267. Serge Gainsbourg - Projection Privée - L'Amour en Privé (2:30)
268. Serge Gainsbourg - Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus - Ballade de Johnny-Jane (3:10)
269. Serge Gainsbourg - Aurais dû Faire Gaffe, le Choc Est Terrible - Zanzibar (2:34)
270. Serge Gainsbourg - Madame Claude - Yesterday Yes a Day (2:59)
271. Serge Gainsbourg - Madame Claude - First Class Ticket / Yesterday On Fender (2:50)
272. Serge Gainsbourg - Vous N'Aurez Pas l'Alsace et la Lorra - Chanson du Chevalier Blanc (1:48)
273. Serge Gainsbourg - Goodbye Emmanuelle - Goodbye Emmanuelle (3:24)
274. Serge Gainsbourg - Les Bronzés - Sea, Sex and Sun (3:25)
275. Serge Gainsbourg - Melancoly Baby - Melancoly Suite (3:11)
276. Serge Gainsbourg - Tapage Nocturne - Tapage Nocturne (2:46)
277. Serge Gainsbourg - Je Vous Aime - Dieu Fumeur De Havanes (3:55)
278. Serge Gainsbourg - Le Physique et le Figuré - Le Physique et le Figuré (2:30)
279. Serge Gainsbourg - Tenue de Soirée - Travelling (4:14)
280. Serge Gainsbourg - Tenue de Soirée - Entrave (1:33)
281. Serge Gainsbourg - Stan the Flasher - Stan / Elodie (2:51)
282. Serge Gainsbourg - Week-End en Mer - Valse de l'Au-Revoir (1:37)
283. Serge Gainsbourg - Strip-Tease - Strip-Tease (2:16)
284. Serge Gainsbourg - La Fille Qui Fait Tchic-Ti-Tchic (2:20)
285. Serge Gainsbourg - Vivre Ensemble - La Noyée (3:02)
286. Serge Gainsbourg - Vivre Ensemble - Hier Ou Demain (2:41)
287. Serge Gainsbourg - Goodbye Emmanuelle - Goodbye Emmanuelle (3:19)

Ahhh. That's noting but a sampler. Best of the movies.

Well Christ, it'll take me years to track down all these albums!

No way dude, they're all available on Phillips CD's. Practically nothing of Serge's is OOP.

Hmmm.....I'm gonna have to raid my piggy bank because (in best Freddie Mercury voice) I want it all.

You just gotta go internationale.

Lovely....that means paying $30 for 25 minutes of music. :)

Imported titles suck. I suppose the liners aren't even in English for all us scholarly types who want to know everything.

Awww, man!

I shouldn't be a stickler for this......I've spent thousands upon thousands for my Beach Boys collection, why not spend a few hundred on Serge?

 ;)

I've checked Amazon, I can't find any of the soundtracks except for Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus and Cannabis. They have the best-of box set. I've already ordered the 11 disc box set from them, that's in the mail. Should I be looking elsewhere for these soundtrack CDs?

Which box did you order? I need to see a tracklist.

(http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/dre100/e148/e14840ulktv.jpg)

This one.

Tracklist is as follows.

Disc: 1 
1. Poinçonneur des Lilas 
2. Poinçonneur des Lilas 
3. Recette de l'Amour Fou 
4. Douze Belles Dans la Peau 
5. Ce Mortel Ennui 
6. Ronsard 
7. Femme des Uns Sous le Corps des Autres 
8. Alcool 
9. Jazz Dans le Ravin 
10. Charleston des Déménageurs de Piano 
11. Jambe de Bios "Friedland" 
12. Claqueur de Doigts 
13. Nuit d'Octobre 
14. Adieu Creature 
15. Anthracite 
16. Mambo Miam Miam 
17. Indifferente 
18. Juenes Femmes et Vieux Messieurs 
19. Amour À la Papa 
20. Cha Cha Cha du Loup 
21. Sois Belle et Tais Toi 
22. Laissez-Moi Tranquille 
23. Judith 
24. Eau a la Bouche 

Disc: 2 
1. Chanson de Prévert 
2. En Relisant Ta Lettre 
3. Rock de Nerval 
4. Oubliettes 
5. Chanson de Maglia 
6. Viva Villa 
7. Amours Perdues 
8. Femmes C'Est du Chinois 
9. Personne 
10. Sonnet d'Arvers 
11. Goemons 
12. Black Trombone 
13. Baudelaire 
14. Intoxicated Man 
15. Quand Tu T'Y Mets 
16. Cigarillos 
17. Requim Pour un Twister 
18. Ce Grand Mechant Vous 
19. Appareil a Sous 
20. Vilaines Filles, Mauvais Garcons 
21. Violon, un Jambon 
22. Javanaise 

Disc: 3 
1. Chez Les Yé-Yé 
2. Sait-On Jamais Ou Va une Femme Quand Elle Vous Quitte 
3. Talkie-Walkie 
4. Fille au Rasoir 
5. Saison des Pluies 
6. Elaeudanla Téïtéïa 
7. Scenic Railway 
8. Temps des Yoyos 
9. Amour Sans Amour 
10. No No Thank's No 
11. Maxim's 
12. Negative Blues 
13. Joanna 
14. La-Bas C'Est Naturel 
15. Pauvre Lola 
16. Quand Mon 6'35 Me Fait Les Yeux Doux 
17. Machins Choses 
18. Sambassadeurs 
19. New York U.S.A. 
20. Couleur Café 
21. Marabout 
22. Ces Petits Riens 
23. Tatoue Jeremie 
24. Coco and Co. 
25. Comment Trouvez Vous Ma Soeur? 

Disc: 4 
1. Chanson du Forcat 
2. Chanson du Forcat II 
3. Manon 
4. Requim Four un C... 
5. Herbe Tendre 
6. Initials B.B. 
7. Comic Strip 
8. Bloody Jack 
9. Docteur Jekyll et Monsieur Hyde 
10. Cayon, Torrey 
11. Shu Ba du Ba Loo Ba 
12. Ford Mustang 
13. Bonnie and Clyde 
14. Black and White 
15. Qui Est "In" Qui Est "Out" 
16. Hold Up 
17. Marilou 
18. Bonnie and Clyde [Version Anglaise] 
19. Comic Strip [Version Anglaise] 
20. Chatterton 
21. Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus 

Disc: 5 
1. Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus - Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg 
2. Anamour 
3. Sous le Soleil Exactement 
4. 69 Annee Erotique - Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg 
5. Elisa 
6. Sucettes 
7. Chanson de Slogan - Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg 
8. Cannabis 
9. Charlie Brown {"A Boy Named Charlie Brown"} 
10. Melody 
11. Ballade de Melody Nelson 
12. Valse de Melody 
13. Ah! Melody 
14. Hotel Particulier 
15. En Melody 
16. Cargo Culte 

Disc: 6 
1. Décadanse - Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg 
2. Sex Shop 
3. Je Suis Venu Te Dire Que Je M'En Vais 
4. Vu de l'Exterieur 
5. Panpan Cucul 
6. Par Hasard et Pas Rase 
7. Des Vents des Pets des Poums 
8. Titicaca 
9. Pamela Popo 
10. Poupée Qui Fait 
11. Hippopodame 
12. Sensuelle et Sans Suite 
13. Nazi Rock 
14. Tata Teutonne 
15. J'Entends des Voix Off 
16. Eva 
17. Smoke Gets in Your Eyes 
18. Zig Zag Avec Toi 
19. Est-Ce Est-Ce Si Bon? 
20. Yellow Star 
21. Rock Around the Bunker 
22. S.S. in Uruguay 

Disc: 7 
1. Homme a Tete de Chou 
2. Chez Max Coiffeur Pour Hommes 
3. Marilou Reggae 
4. Transit a Marilou 
5. Flash Forward 
6. Aeroplanes 
7. Premiers Symptomes 
8. Ma Lou Marilou 
9. Variationa Sur Marilou 
10. Muertre a l'Extincteur 
11. Marilou Sous la Neige 
12. Lunatic Asylum 
13. Ami Caouette 
14. Cadavre Exquis 
15. My Lady Héroine 
16. Trois Millions de Joconde 
17. Good-Bye Emmanuelle 
18. Sea Sex and Sun 
19. Mister Iceberg 
20. Sea Sex and Sun [Version Anglaise] 
21. Mister Iceberg [Version Anglaise] 
22. Ces Petits Riens - Catherine Deneuve, Serge Gainsbourg 
23. Souviens-Toi de M'Oublier - Catherine Deneuve, Serge Gainsbourg 

Disc: 8 
1. Javanaise Remake 
2. Aux Armes et Caetera 
3. Locataires 
4. Des Laids des Laids 
5. Brigade des Stups 
6. Veille Canaille (You Rascal You) 
7. Lola Rastaquouère 
8. Relax Baby Be Cool 
9. Daisy Temple 
10. Eau et Gaz À Tous Les Étages 
11. Pas Long Feu 
12. Marilou Reggae [Dub] 
13. Overseas Telegram 
14. Ecce Homo 
15. Mickey Maousse 
16. Juif et Dieu 
17. Shush Shush Charlotte 
18. Toi Mourir 
19. Nostalgie Camarade 
20. Bana Basadi Balalo 
21. Evguénie Sokolov 
22. Negusa Nagast 
23. Strike 
24. Bad News from the Stars 
25. Harley Davidson 
26. Elle Est Si 

Disc: 9 
1. Sous le Soleil Exactement 
2. Sous le Soleil Exactement 
3. C'Est la Cristallisation Comme Dit Stendhal 
4. Pas Mal Pas Mal du Tout 
5. J'Etais Fait Pour Les Sympathies 
6. Photographes et Religieuses 
7. Rien Rien J'Disais Ca Comme Ca 
8. Jour Comme un Autre 
9. Boomerang 
10. Poison Violent, C'Est Ça l'Amour 
11. De Plus en Plus, de Moins en Moins 
12. Roller Girl 
13. Ne Dis Rien (Say No More) 
14. Pistolet Jo 
15. G.I. Jo 
16. Je N'Avais Qu'un Seul Mot a Lui Dire 
17. Ballade de Johnny-Jane 
18. Camion Jaune 
19. Banjo au Bord du Styx 
20. Rock & Roll Autour de Johnny 
21. Abominable Strip-Tease 
22. Joe Banjo 
23. Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus 
24. Je T'Aime Mon Non Plus au Motel 
25. Je Pense Queue 
26. Je Vous Salue Marie 
27. Fautive 
28. Dieu Fumeur de Havanes 

Disc: 10 
1. Love on the Beat 
2. Sorry Angel 
3. HMM HMM HMM 
4. Kiss Me Hardy 
5. No Comment 
6. I'm the Boy 
7. Harley David (Son of a Bitch) 
8. Lemon Incest - Charlotte Gainsbourg, Serge Gainsbourg 

Disc: 11 
1. You're Under Arrest 
2. Five Easy Pisseuses 
3. Baille Baille Samantha 
4. Suck Baby Suck 
5. Gloomy Sunday 
6. Enfants de la Chance 
7. Shotgun 
8. Glass Securit 
9. Dispatch Box 
10. Mon Légionnaire 

Disc 9 is the complete Anna/Je T'aime soundtracks.

Yeah I figured that was the case. But what about those other soundtracks? Amazon doesn't seem to have them, except Cannabis. Do I have to go to another website?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B0000AQJPI/202-4639282-4471015

That's for Cannabis, I've ordered that.

Look at the Serge section there, you'll find a lot of goodies.

Funny, my first introduction to Serge was that Love and the Beat series.....what a lousy compilation, now in retrospect. Doesn't even cover his reggae material.

L' Homme À Tête de Chou....I still don't know what to think about this album. It's definitely Serge's darkest work.

BUMP!

Serge's thread is still too good to hit bottom!

Serge is all about hitting bottom.

Good point. Nazi Rock, anybody?

Love on the Beat
Serge Gainsbourg: A Fistful of Gitanes by Sylvie Simmons

by Mary Jacobi
November 13 - 19, 2002 
 
Serge Gainsbourg once described "Je T'Aime, Moi Non Plus" (I Love You, Me Neither), his orgasmic 1969 duet with Jane Birkin, as a "chanson anti-baise"—an anti-f*** song. Such contradictions abound in Sylvie Simmons's sympathetic if skin-deep biography of the singer, songwriter, actor, screenwriter, and novelist. Born Lucien Ginsburg in Paris to Russian Jews, forced to wear a yellow star in 1942 (a period revisited on his 1975 album Rock Around the Bunker), Gainsbourg challenged audiences with his renegade behavior, risqué lyrics, and genre surfing—1979's reggae version of "La Marseillaise" was a succès de scandale.
Gainsbourg "created his own musical form out of his lack of a singing voice and his personal obsessions, a kind of ongoing autobiographical erotic novella," according to an obit included in A Fistful of Gitanes. In his Nabokovian masterpiece, Histoire de Melody Nelson (1971), a Rolls-Royce driver runs into a red-haired 15-year-old English girl, deemed the "Spirit of Ecstasy"; the "déliceuse enfant" dies in a plane crash soon after her sexual initiation. And in the darker L'Homme à Tête de Chou ("The Man With the Cabbage Head," 1976), a journalist brutally murders his unfaithful girlfriend and serenades her corpse. Simmons lets Serge explain these preoccupations: "Love is dirty; the dirtier love is, the more beautiful it is."

The provocateur described by lover Birkin as pudique—reserved, shy, discreet, chaste—developed his dissipated alter ego, Gainsbarre, after she left him, ushering in his heartbreaking decline, marked by alcoholism and a debilitating cigarette addiction. (Right before he died, doctors were threatening to amputate his artereosclerotic legs.) Reminiscent of de Sade, he described his career as "a search for the truth via an injection of perversity"; upon his death at age 62 in 1991, President Mitterand dubbed him "our Baudelaire." Simmons delineates the wide reach of Gainsbourgisme, from Air to Pulp to Beck, but fails to mention Japanese chanteuse Kahimi Karie, whose 1994 Girly EP is an homage to Melody Nelson. While his music has enjoyed a revival, he remains identified with his self-cultivated lecherous persona; this biography, though breezy, offers a welcome corrective, showing the artist's lesser-known facets. Most necessary now in the field of Serge studies is a complete English-language translation of his lyrics, a definitive guide to such playful profundities as "L'amour physique est sans issue." 

Excellent article, Ian. Have you read this book?

I always thought the Gainsbarre thing was so cool, man. It was like a complete reinvention. Not many artists do that. Serge, once again, ahead of the pack.

Yes indeed. It's great. Sylvie Simmons has been my favorite music writer for a while now.

Is the book out of print?

Nope.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0306811839/102-7220832-7995366?v=glance&n=283155

Man, wouldn't you have loved to have seen Serge write an autobiography? The mind boggles at what could've been covered there.

True. If his lyrics could be translated and published in book form, that would serve well though.

Ehhhh, I would feel two ways about translated lyrics. There's always something lost in the translation. I translated Je T'Aime Moi Non Plus and the lyrics weren't as shocking as they were "weird". The original language always has the most meaning behind it.

Os Mutantes hurt their reputation, in my opinion, by recording an English-language album of some of their classics. The lyrics just sounded dumb.

It's important that a translator has a deep knowledge of the text they are working with, as a literal translation of words is a bigg difference from translation of meaning.
Perhaps the greatest example of that is the difference between the 50's and 90's translations of Kurt Weill's work.

Exactly. I'm sure a workable job could be done with Serge's lyrics.....but I don't want to imagine the furor it would lead to in France, to have Serge's poetry translated.

Haha, I think it would cause a greater furor here, if pseudo-hipsters could understand what the "cute little ugly French dude" was really singing about.

Yeah, I wouldn't want to be the guy who reads the lyrics to Vu de L'Exterieur after having played it on a romantic night with his girlfriend.

Ian, I'm going through my Serge stuff....I have a track called "Fugue", off of one of the jazz compilations. Do you have this track?

Well as Gainsbourg apparently said: "Love is dirty; the dirtier love is, the more beautiful it is." So maybe that would be a relaxing thought.
But anyway contrary what it says in the Jacobi article he did have a singing voice and sang pretty straightforwardly, albeit kind of dramatic on his first records, but then he started to talk over the tracks instead, also his duet partners like Bardot, Birkin and his daughter didn't display big voices as well. So sometimes on his records it's like the music takes the backseat and is more background music for some spoken passion play. He also arrranges the voices a little like it's done on Leonard Cohen records, where there is often angelic female background voices and then a dark male voice in the front, maybe a little like the beauty and beast setting he sometimes was photographed in. So in some ways he may be a little of a french dirtier, campier version of Leonard Cohen and  maybe also a little like Lou Reed around the "Transformer/ Berlin" period.

Søren

I think that was due to the fact that his voice was starting to go by age 40 thanks to his years of tobacco abuse. On You're Under Arrest, the man can barely let out a rasp. Kind of like Dennis Wilson near the end. Eventually, all Serge could do was whisper or speak in a rasp. Mostly, he whispered.

I don't know, because he actually also sings on some of his later tracks, and even though I don't doubt that his voice was not good because of smoking, maybe it was just as much a persona he developed for his records.

Søren

Well, that was the whole Gainsbarre thing he had going on there after his relationship with Jane Birkin fell apart. His alter ego.

So Ian......you give that stuff a listen yet? I'm dying to hear your opinion, brother.

That was around 79 he turned into Gainsbarre wasn’t it ? But if you listen to his records he already started talking on “Requiem Pour Un Con”, where his voice doesn’t sound particularly shot, so I think it was also something he did for dramatic purposes. Later on it probably became a necessity because of his deteriorating voice. If you also look at his duet partners, none of them weren’t really great singers in the normal sense of the word. So maybe there was also a punkish attitude behind it, that it didn’t matter if you could sing, as long as you had personality or something to say.

Søren

I think that's always what Serge was looking for in his duet partners. I don't think it's too off-beat to claim that Jane Birkin was probably the best thing that ever happened to him.

Since Serge became Gainsbarre in the early 80s.....wouldn't he, not John Mellencamp, be the first "The Artist Formerly Known As..."?

Nah, there's Jim/Roger McGuinn and Devadip Carlos Santana.

I forgot McGuinn.....piss it.

Spinning L' Homme À Tête de Chou now.....still don't know what to think of this album. It's so dark, man.

Sez the man wit da Suicide avatar.

Well, Serge and Suicide are two very different types of music. I don't identify Serge with "dark" music. And hell, that Suicide album isn't all THAT dark. Frankie Teardrop is about the darkest the album gets.

Ahh, see, that's where you've gone astray. To me I think of Serge like Roxy Music, half-dark, half-light. Love Is The Drug AND In Every Dream Home A Heartache, dig?

Ahhhhhhhh now I see where you're coming from. That's the humanity in Serge's music. Everyone has their light and dark sides. Really, when you think about it, a lot of Serge's music is dark. Dark in a seriocomic way, but dark nonetheless. I mean come on, this was a Jew lashing out at Nazi Germany on Rock Around The Bunker.

I'm giving the soundtrack set another listen, I really dig these tracks, especially the earlier, jazzy ones. Serge just sounds like he's from another, cooler planet.

Think it's time for this thread to RIP just like Serge is doing right now.

Actually, this thread must not RIP!

Ian, what else is on that DVD set? It's in the mail and I'm too impatient. Can you give me an idea as to what's on there?

Do you open your Xmas gifts before Xmas morning?

I always open one on Christmas Eve.

Lots of cool Bardot, Birkin and Karina and the entire Melody Nelson TV special are on there!

Cool beans brother.

There's no cooler video than 69 Annee Erotique.

This DVD is gonna rock.

Dude, when you see the Bardot Harley Davidson video, you'll jump out the window.

I'll have my window ready when I watch it.

I don't think his dark side is so surprising. I think he reminds a little of Roman Polanski who also come from Eastern Europe and like Gainsbourg experienced the war and persecution of jews. Maybe because of that it seems that they both look at life as some kind of black comedy. The movie "Bitter Moon" by Polanski about a couple, who sort of disintegrates in sexual excess,  seems like something Gainsbourg could have made a record about.

Søren

Nice comparison. Except Rock Around The Bunker is about ten thousand times better than The Pianist, as a piece of art.

I got the Serge DVD set in the mail today and watched the whole thing in one marathon four hour session. Awesome clips.

It was all good until my mother walked in while Lemon Incest was playing - she freaked out to say the very least.

Lock the door when you jerk off, dude!

 :D

Man, you should've been there. She flipped sh*t. Especially when I said that Charlotte was Serge's daughter.

What did you think of the Bardot and Birkin stuff?

Excellent stuff.

Favorites?

A lot of the early films, the interviews, the Melody Nelson TV special, Love On The Beat (goshdarn!), Lemon Incest (double goshdarn! Charlotte was hot when she was 13!), Vieille Canaille, and Serge's introduction of his scared shitless son (or at least I think it was his son).

Buh-buh-buh-bump!

I'm probably going to end up going back to my DVD set and counting the number of times Serge has a cigarette near him. Probably numbers in the dozens.

Dude, Rod Serling would have told him to cut back. Serge ALWAYS has one burning.

From the DVD, I got the impression that he had more than one heart attack.

"One look at his face
Showed the hard road he’d come" -
Bob Dylan "Only A Hobo"


AKA "You're Under Arrest" cover photo.

He sure was one ugly man on that cover.

I dunno  I thought you all would ejoy this

check out  Vh1.com and  go to the webjunk20 page...  there is a lovely littel clip of our  boy Sergeie  puttin the moves on a pre cracked out Whitney Houston.....  I made me laugh I thought it might make yall laugh

xoxox suga

I've been trying to get Suga here to get into some Serge, with some reasonable success. She has to use da internet to do her buying, I told her. I would send her stuff over AIM, but she has shitty dial-up. Of course I could always mail her copies of that Serge box set when it comes in the mail.

Nice  I can  dig it...

Mail em away

xoxoxo
suga

Ian, what's your opinion of L'Homme À Tête de Chou? This was originally my least favorite of Serge's concept albums, now I think it's dethroned Rock Around The Bunker. You said RATB was the most subversive move by him.....I think an album about a serial killer with a title that translates to "Cabbage-Head Man" is far more subversive. Sick, even.

Nothing was more subversive at the time than the Nazi-apprpriation. The punk movement's similar themology dimmed the outrageousness of Bunker a bit.
Tete De Chou is definitely the most shocking thing he ever did.
The track Lemon Incest is up there with these, of course.

Time has dimmed the impact of Rock Around The Bunker, I would think. The Nazi atrocities only lasted a few years but have shaped the last sixty years since the war ended. Serial killers have been around for a much longer time. That's a more timeless theme. We associate the Nazis with the period between the late 20s to the mid 40s. Serial killers have been around since the first murder occurred.

L'Homme À Tête de Chou may be the most shocking thing he ever did, but if our French-speaking friends on the board could probably attest, his reggae reworking of the La Marseillaise was probably even more shocking and subversive.

goshdarn it, bump this motherfucker!

Totally agreed with your words.

I've noticed a misconception about Serge's music. People seem to think he went erotic and perverted and sick on Initials BB and Histoire De Melody Nelson.......but a lot of his jazz material has much of the same kinds of lyrics.

This thread goes to 20 pages, then I'll be happy. :)

I think the suck-cess of Les Sucettes in anee erotique Sexty-Sex crystallised for 'Bourg what he could get away with in the pop world.

I still have to track down all these songs he wrote for other singers. All I have are the tracks he did with Brigitte Bardot and the four Jane Birkin tracks on the '69 album.

Ever notice how Smoke Gets In Your Eyes has the vocals mixed really low? I guess Serge wasn't confident with his English.

Aww, man, you gotta. A lot of his most important music was written for others, from Bardot to Gall to Birkin to Adjani. His feminine alter-egos.
PULL MARINE!!!!!!!!!!

Brigitte Bardot has a 3 CD set out that has all of her recordings, and a goodly number of them are Serge songs. Jane Birkin doesn't seem to have a box set, just a bunch of albums that are mostly out of print. I have a daunting task ahead of me.

Birkin has a box set indeed, with her entire Serge output.
All Bardot rules, even the non-Serge.

The songs must be really good, but the singing leaves something to be desired. I don't think either of them were particularly good singers.

I've got "Il les fait chanter", a compilation with all the girl singers he wrote for: Adjani, Deneuve, Bardot, Gall...
Here's a link to the tracklist: http://www.universalmusic.fr/servlet/FrontProductServlet?action=view&product_id=73145425422

And you like GAINSBOURG'S voice???

Serge's voice fits his music. I always loved his tobacco-induced ranting on later albums. His early crooning isn't offensive. When he tried singing near the end of his life, I cringe a bit (see for example the excerpts from the 1989 concert on the DVD set).

He was a better jazz crooner than a rock 'n roll singer. He probably recognized this and resorted to his whispered ranting.

And Birkin and Bardot's voices fit that music perfectly as well.
Don't hold female voices to a higher standard than males!
Gainsbourg makes Leonard Cohen sound like Tim Buckley. Thankfully, we don't use those type of standards.

Exactly. It doesn't matter if the voice is good or distinctive, as long as it fits his music. We can draw parallels with Bob Dylan. His voice fits his music as well. And like Serge, he was a very ugly man with a mostly horrible voice.

Nah, Dylan has a great voice, just listen to House Of The Rising Sun, Moonshiner or Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You.
But I know what you're saying.
I'd say Cohen is a better comparison.

I always thought that the presence of a Bardot or a Birkin was mostly ornamental on Serge's part.....Serge trying to make himself look a little better by surrounding himself with a beautiful woman. We all know that he loved these women very much but there must have been a method to his madness.

No way man, they served a very concrete goal of presenting his more vulnerable compositional work.
And if you gotta have SOMEBODY on your arm, why not them?
He could have chosen someone far more attractive than Birkin if he had wished.
She was his Marianne Faithfull.

Well, I have some buying ahead of me before I get what Serge was going for with his ladies and his music. And yes, I too would've loved having a Bardot or a Birkin on my arm.

If I remember correctly, Serge had three wives, am I right? Jane Birkin was presumably his second. I know next to nothing about the mother of his son.

Man, that Love On The Beat video was something else. If only MTV in America was so liberal...

Ian, this is sort of related to Serge. He did a trio with Jane Birkin and Jacques Dutronc on the second disc of the DVD. Do you listen to any of Jacques' material? Every article I've read on him says he's like the French version of Dylan.

For all those interested, tomorrow I will be posting my essay on Serge's life and music.

He's way too musically tame to be considered in the Dylan mold, to my ears.
Maybe the lyrics are wild, I wouldn't know.
Daniele would be a good person to ask on that.

Well, who knows if she'll chime in here.

I think she posted some Dutronc on the SMiLE Shop. Check it out.

Nice avatar.

I'll check it out.

Don't know if anybody knows the reggae track "Libertango" by Grace Jones,  where there's some spoken french parts, which is very Gainsbourg-like, they should have had him do it. It was recorded with Sly and Robbie and some of the other musicians, that were also on "Aux Armes Et Cætera", so who knows maybe it was inspired by their encounter with him, coming to Jamaica to record with them. She was also a little decadent, or at least that was how she staged herself, so they would have made a good couple.

Søren

I've heard of that track, but haven't heard it.

Have you ever read the laundry list of reggae musicians on Gainsbourg's reggae albums? It's shocking.

Serge Gainsbourg was the dirty old bastard of popular music; a French musician with an insatiable appetite for vice (specifically, alcohol, cigarettes, and women) and provocateur whose lewd musical output made him legendary in his native France.

He was born Lucien Ginzburg in Paris, France on April 2, 1928. His parents were Russian Jews who fled their native Russia in 1917 during the Bolshevik Revolution and settled in France. Young Lucien expressed early interests in art and in music, studying the guitar and piano. After time spent teaching, he turned to painting as a pastime. He never stayed with art and destroyed all of his creations in 1958.

In the forties, Lucien's father Joseph (himself a major figure on the scene) helped him get a job on the local cabaret circuit as a bar pianist, and Lucien began to gain an interest in jazz music. He found time to marry during this time, and married Elisabeth Levitsky in 1951. He then left his job as a bar pianist and went back to the world of art, for a brief time.

In 1954, Lucien began to try his hand at songwriting, submitting six compositions, two of which survive today ("Défense d’Afficher" by Pia Colombo and "Les Amours Perdues", which he gave to Juliette Gréco). He spent 1954-1957 working as a songwriter for the legendary transvestite cabaret "Chez Madame Arthur" and he worked on and off as a pianist.

1958 was a landmark year for Lucien, as he changed his name to Serge Gainsbourg, something a little more French, in his eyes. After destroying all of his artwork, he began to work hard at pursuing a music career, working as a pianist/guitarist in the "Milord l’Arsouille" cabaret. Around this time, he met the legendary songwriter and author Boris Vlan, who encouraged Serge to write his own material and perform it.

Early Gainsbourg performances were exercises in patience, his audiences either hated or loved him. Denis Bourgeois spotted the young Gainsbourg's talent and offered to record a demo for Serge. A few days afterwards, he signed to Philips (where he stayed for his whole career).

Upon hooking up with Boris Vlan's arranger Alain Goraguer (with whom he would work until 1964), Serge recorded his first album, "Du Chant a la Une" The album was met with total hostility by more than one French critic, but went on to win the Grand Prix de l’Académie Charles Cros in 1959. This album featured the tracks "Le Poinçonneur des Lilas" and "Ce Mortel Ennui".

Serge's songwriting took center stage with his work, and he became an in-demand songwriter throughout the sixties. He was praised in the French press for his originality and his creativity.

In 1959, Gainsbourg took another job in the film business, performing in 1959's "Voulez-vous Danser avec Moi?", where he met legendary French sex symbol Brigitte Bardot (who will factor in later). He also pursued a side career of composing music for films, his first being "L'eau À La Bouche" in 1959. His second album, "No. 2", came out this year, which was another collection of cabaret-inflected jazz, with standouts being "Adieu Créature" and "Jeunes Femmes Et Vieux Messieurs".

In 1961, Serge delivered his third album, "L'Etonnant Serge Gainsbourg" (aka "No. 3"), which put his love for literature at the forefront, with two songs as tributes to famous authors (Victor Hugo and Jacques Prévert). This album added pop influences to Gainsbourg's jazzier material ("Le Sonnet d'Arvers"), which made it the best album of his career to that point.

In 1962, Serge released "No. 4", one of his finest jazz albums, which featured the classics "Intoxicated Man" and "Black Trombone". Around this time, he began expressing distaste with the French recording process, and began to seek out other venues for recording. He finally settled on England, venturing out in 1963 to record a 4-track single ("Villaines Filles, Mauvais Garçons", "L'Appareil A Sous", "La Javanaise", "Un Violon, Un Jambon") and his fifth album, "Confidentiel", which featured the tracks "Chez Les Ye-Ye" and "La Fille Au Rasoir".

Early in 1964, Serge married Françoise-Antoinette Pancrazzi (until 1966, then they split up only to reform again and have another child, Paul, in 1967), who bore him his first daughter Natacha (August 8). 1964 also brought forth Gainsbourg's most eclectic collection yet, "Gainsbourg Percussions", his final album with arranger Alain Gorauger. A legendary jazz album, it was one of the first albums to highlight the use of African and third-world percussion colors among the jazz textures. The chosen single was "New York-USA".

Throughout 1965-67, Serge spent his time writing for other artists, notably Juliette Gréco, Petula Clark, France Gall (for whom he wrote "Les Sucettes", a fairly suggestive tune about fellatio), and Anna Karina (for whom he composed a musical) and composing for films. His songs became a hot commodity, and actresses and singers alike were clamoring to record them. He crossed paths with Brigitte Bardot again, writing a four-track single for her.

By 1967, a revolution was taking place in French popular music. Rock 'n roll had hit the French shores in 1964 with local hero Johnny Hallyday's French-language covers of American rock 'n roll songs. Serge, always hip to a new trend, embraced the new, radical sounds that engulfed the cultural landscape of Paris.

In the fall of 1968, Serge met up with Brigitte Bardot yet again and fell madly in love with her. Around the same time, his music suddenly became deliciously erotic and delirious. The pair would record a few songs together ("Bonnie and Clyde", "Comic Strip"). The album "Initials BB" came out at the end of 1968, which featured Serge's new rock material.

One track in particular did not sit well with Bardot. "Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus" was written by Gainsbourg as the "penultimate love song", and Bardot found the track to be too controversial and asked Serge not to release it (he didn't, it never came out until 1986).

Serge had no problem finding someone else to record the song with him, and he found that person in Jane Birkin, who had recently made headlines in her native England in Antonioni's classic "Blow-Up" (which featured, for the time, some racy nudity from her). Serge and Jane had met on the set of the movie "Slogan", and after falling madly in love, the pair went back to "Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus" (and other tracks). Released in late 1969, the track became a monster hit, rocketing to the top of the charts throughout Europe (it hit, ironically, #69 in America). Many radio programmers found Birkin's moaning during the track to be offensive, and the song was pulled from many markets. Serge decided to leave the track off of the album "Jane Birkin et Serge Gainsbourg". This album featured Jane's initial four-track single mixed up with a few Gainsbourg tracks, many of them re-recordings of songs written for other artists ("Sous Le Soleil Exactement", "Les Sucettes").

Serge devoted less and less of his time to songwriting and performing, preferring to follow his new wife around on her movie assignments. He did, however, return to performing and writing in 1971, with the concept album "Histoire De Melody Nelson". Best described as the dirty old man's attempt at his own R&B record, edging Marvin Gaye by a few years, "Histoire De Melody Nelson" was a song-cycle about Gainsbourg's love for a 15 year old girl. Not a huge hit at the time, the album grew in posture to become a landmark in French popular music. Jane Birkin also gave birth to Serge's second daughter Charlotte on July 21, 1971. The single "La Décadanse" followed at the end of the year, and the same critics who praised "Histoire De Melody Nelson" slammed the single, calling it a work of very poor taste.

Serge spent most of 1972 writing for other artists, including France Gall (who had forgiven him for "Les Sucettes") and Jacques Dutronc. In 1973 (after suffering a heart attack), Gainsbourg went to work on his next album, "Vu de l'Exterieur", another song-cycle displaying Serge's love for sex (the title track) and the noisier bodily functions ("Des Vents, des Pets, des Poums").

1975 brought Serge's next concept album, "Rock Around The Bunker". Scathing in tone and texture, the album was a pointed attack on the same Nazis who had made one-time Lucien Ginzburg wear the Star of David during the German occupation of France in World War II. It also featured one of Gainsbourg's precious few English performances, a cover of "Smoke Gets In Your Eyes".

In late 1975, Serge added another job to his resume - director. Taking Jane Birkin to the south of France, they filmed "Je T'Aime...Moi Non Plus", the story of a man's love for a young girl. The 1976 release of the film saw it torn to pieces.

In 1976, Serge delivered his final concept album, "L'Homme À Tête de Chou". Arguably his most shocking concept album, this one dealt with the exploits of a serial killer. It also introduced what would become a prevalent theme later in his career - reggae.

In 1979, Gainsbourg ventured to Jamaica to record his next album, "Aux Armes et Cætera", which displayed Gainsbourg on the rocksteady tip, with legendary reggae maestros Sly and Robbie, and several members of Bob Marley's backing band (including wife Rita - according to legend, Bob Marley was quite unhappy that Serge made his wife sing sexual lyrics). On this album, Serge shocked French audiences with his reggae reworking of the sacred "La Marseillaise", which led to absolute discontent in France.

Late in 1979, Gainsbourg went out on the road as a touring artist (his earlier excursions were extremely unpopular) and was hailed as a hero in his homeland.

1980 brought the biggest turning point of Gainsbourg's life. Jane Birkin had enough of Serge's drunken behavior and took daughter Charlotte and left him, leaving Serge brutally depressed. Around this time, he created a new character for himself in "Gainsbarre", an alcoholic suffering from depression (which was precisely Gainsbourg's case).

"Mauvaises Nouvelles des Etoiles" followed in 1981. Another reggae album, this was the lesser of his two reggae collections, but still featured the contributions of many of the players of Aux Armes et Cætera. The track "Evguenie Sokolov" featured, of all things, fart noises (presumably provided by Gainsbourg). This same year, he met and fell in love with Eurasian singer Bambou (who would bear him son Lucien in 1986 and scream for him on the track "Love On The Beat").

1983 brought Serge's next directorial work, "Equateur", which was an absolute disaster for all parties involved. Released later that year, the movie was a complete and utter flop.

Venturing to America in 1984, Serge worked with producer Billy Rush in New Jersey on a new album, "Love On The Beat". Experimenting with synth funk this time around, Serge's new album proved to be his most controversial recording (and his best seller). The single "Lemon Incest" provoked the ire of the French people, with a video that was truly suggestive (Gainsbourg and daughter Charlotte perform the song on a bed, both scantily clad). No low was too low for Gainsbourg in 1984; he went on French television for an appearance and told the other guest, Whitney Houston, that he wanted to foda her.

Serge returned to live performance in 1985, bringing the house down at a legendary performance at the Casino de Paris. Serge spent 1986 writing a film and album for his daughter Charlotte, entitled "Charlotte For Ever".

In 1987, Serge delivered what turned out to be his final album, "You're Under Arrest". Working again with Billy Rush in New Jersey, Serge's new album featured an anti-drug song ("Aux Enfants de la Chance", ironically for Gainsbourg) and a rap version of Edith Plaf's "Mon Légionnaire".

1988 saw Serge return to live performance, with similar results as in 1985, but the shows (some of them filmed) displayed a then-60 year old alcoholic who was teetering on the brink of death. In 1989 he was rushed to the hospital for an operation on his liver and told to cease his drinking, that it was a case of life or death.

Serge spent 1989 and 1990 writing albums for Bambou and his ex-wife Jane Birkin (for whom he had written three others in the 70s and 80s). He had become increasingly reclusive near the end of his life, the fans' messages piling up outside his Parisian home.

On March 2, 1991, Bambou found Gainsbourg dead on the living room floor of their house, this time from a fatal heart attack. The outpouring of grief surrounding his death was huge in his native France, with even the French president praising him and his work.

Serge grew to be a near-mythical figure in France and around the world, with a legion of musicians discovering him and his work. Long gone, his music still provokes and unsettles, and his legacy lives on.

Right on, you got it.

Man I wish some other people would contribute to this thread. You'd think if it went 20 pages it would interest everyone. Ian, you and I have been kicking the horse for a good month!

Let's keep kicking.

Yeah, I don't feel like everything's been said with this thread. Maybe we'll get it to 30 pages, that's my new target.

Ian, what's your thoughts on Du Chant a la Une? His first album.

I made a few comments about 15 pages back, but was basically was told to shut up because I was wrong. I'm a big Serge fan & have been collecting his work for the past 12 years or so, but I know when I'm not wanted.

Harvey, your views are appreciated by me. Please, continue on with us.

Could you quote that???

Ahhh, I see.
I didn't mean to come off so rude. I apologise!
I have indeed heard Polnareff's and I love it.

The little I know about Serge has already been stated by you two more eloquently. That's why I don't contribute. I read it all, though, so please keep posting, Ian and Jason!

Oh it's a great track and the rest of the record "Nightclubbing" is also good, same kind of crispy reggae as on Gainsbourgs record. "Libertango" is actually a tango written by "tango nuevo" maestro Astor Piazzolla, it's was a very creative idea to turn it into a reggae and it works beautifully. As far as I can see there was about 10 musicians including three backgorund vocalists on "Aux Armes Et Cætera", that's not so shocking.

Søren

Well it's shocking in the sense that he actually knew who to find for the reggae albums.

Ian, thoughts on Du Chant A La Une?

I need to listen again.

I think this is the most cabaret of Serge's jazz material, and the most restrained as far as the performances are concerned. It has at least two bona-fide classics on it.

What about No. 2, Ian?

Very underrated, still a BIT straight, but chez cool. The musicians are a little too in-the-pocket, but the whole deal manages to swing under Serge's baton. A great album for cocktails with your special lady, with Percussions and Je T'aime a cool follow-on as the night gets "cozy".

Dude, we haven't even discussed Je T'Aime here.

This was the first Gainsbourg song I heard (BIG surprise) and it made me want to look further into him (the fact that the Vatican banned it made me want to even more).

I feel two ways about it now. It's probably his most overrated tune, but it's still a great song. Great melody line.

The melody is almost a complete rip of Whiter Shade Of Pale. I like it mainly for Birkin, my goddess-thing.

Yeah, I thought it sounded like the Procol Harum song myself. There's a very bare-bones earlier rendition of the melody on the track Scène de Bal 1 from  the movie Les Coleurs Verts.

What about L'Etonnant Serge Gainsbourg, Ian?

I don't know if it's shocking, Sly and Robbie are probably the most famous reggae rhythm group there ever was, everybody seems to have been playing with them at one time or the other, Sly is/was kind of reggaes answer to Steve Gadd. The I-Threes were Marleys background singers, so they were all pretty well-known.
BTW the melody to WSOP and "Je T'aime" really isn't the same, even if they remind of each other. The intro to WSOP was inspired by Bach, something that Gainsbourg might have taken them up on, I think he did use classical music quite often in his music. "Lady Heroin" is also based on a classical theme.

Søren

"Lemon Incest", too.

BUMP!

goshdarn it I'mma keep bumping this here thread until SOMEONE responds!

Ian, what's your favorite Serge track? After a good month of solid listening, L'Anamour is my favorite.

La Decadanse.

i really am aroused by this wild uninhibited individual...tell me ha anyone heard Vannesa Paradis'92 collab. w/Lenny Kravitz?? it's tres awesome!!!

I haven't heard that, is it any good?

the individual in ? i gainsbourg

Huh?

She is a french songstress, pop in nature. anyway yes, they collab. around'91
the album is very retro 60's & 70's sounding pop candy, with some teamy 70's porn inst. music
and her lusty breathing.

Minor US hits "be my baby", a kravitz original, not the cover of spector.
 and "sunday mondays" a homage to '67 era Monkees....yes, produced & played by Lenny himself.

She had an affair with Serge, but she wasn't the pretty starlet he could control. Serge was an exacting, cruel man sometimes. Womanizers are like that.

KNOW SUMTHIN' ABOUT 'EM AYE?

I know a few things, yes.

Ian, should we let this thread rest, or is there more we could talk about?

The wicked never rest.

Well, you suggest the next facet of our Serge conversation.

The Serge women.

Birkin and Bardot, baby. Anna Karina too, that clip on the Serge DVD is a great one.

Did he ever do anything with Nico? Relationship-wise, I mean. I know she did that version of Strip-Tease.

Nope!
We can talk Gall, Adjani and Paradis too.

I tried carrying on a conversation about Vanessa Paradis with the guy up there, but he was of little help.

I liked the clips with France Gall on the Serge DVD. I wonder if that's an excerpt from an actual movie or TV show. I wonder about a lot of those clips, some of them seem like they only have one song where he might have done two or three.

Yes, it's merely a best-of TV appearances thing. There's much more stuff floating around on the collector's market.

The thing that shocked me about that DVD was a lack of a "Je T'Aime..." video. You would think of all the songs covered, that would be one of them. But I guess not.

It's me again, Dr. UNH!!!

hey all i know about Vannessa P's '92 USA debut CD was a collab. w/ Lenny(justify my love) kravitz.

And it rules!!! It really whizzes past quick album, i think it's less than 45 min.

Plus i think shes on his "Cant Get u offa my mind" Video'95....& she and J.Depp have had a long fling as well...

Care to reply? i think VP 92 is outta print now tho.

I'm only interested in her for her work with Gainsbourg. Where the hell is Ian? We need to get this thread going again.

Ian, is it just me or does Zig Zig Avec Toi and SS In Uruguay have the exact same melody?

His work with France Gall ispretty important in terms of commercial success. I was just listning to her this morning, (Bébé requin) and she was part of the whole femme/enfant trip, and we know Darian Sahanaja is a fan.

I do remember seing these 2 sing on French TV, on a show produced by Marité et Gilbert Carpentier. Cant remember the title of the show though. That where you saw Brigitt Bardot singing "Harly Davidson" in very scant attire on a Harley Davidson of course.

There's a clip on the Gainsbourg DVD with the two of them singing on a TV show together, then Serge mimes to Marilu. I didn't see anything with Brigitte Bardot on there. She only features in two of those clips.

There is a whole Bonnie and Clyde sketch as well, as they were called. I have a BB video I'll check it for you at some stage. Ya know BB and Serge, BB and Sacha Distel (tu es le soleil de ma vie).

I will never understand how a man as ugly as Gainsbourg managed to have relationships with the most beautiful women in France (and henceforth, THE WORLD).

You've seen pictures of me?
It's the rock, babiez.

Maybe so. Who knows anymore? Maybe he just was great at sweet-talking the ladies.

I do. It's the music. All the cliches are still just as true as ever.

He doesn't seem like the most enviable person, if those interviews are anything to go by.

Neither does any rock/pop/jazz star.
He actually had a better life than most.

if you want my opinion, I kind of always found him repulsive, but then again I am not one of the most beautiful women in the world. Who knows. Maybe its the little boy lost lost,or maybe the cigarettes, ya know you could be sure to be able to bum one of him.

At least his drugs were alcohol and tobacco.

Ever noticed how Serge doesn't seem to blow any smoke out of his nose when he smokes? Methinks he doesn't smoke the "traditional" way.

Sez you!  :)

Hey it sjust strikes me from your avater Jason. there is a kind of resemblance between Serge and Thom Yorke, hahahaha Ian.

I think the older he got, the worse he got as far as looks are concerned. Back in the late 60s he looked like a player. Don't put your lopks down, Zelil.

Serge looks like Ian a little bit.

Yeah, he was like Keith Richards. Keith was kinda handsome in the 60's.


Exactly.

If you showed me a picture of a late-30s Gainsbourg from 1967-68, I'd think that he was from a much cooler planet. I always thought he was incredibly "hip", despite his age.

and Thom Yorke?? ergo Ian/Thom Yorke, no way, couldnt possibly be :-)

Cya people,  there hungreeeeee little people in my house, and you know the French and food, we dont mess with dat.

I see no similarities in Ian and Thom Yorke. None whatsoever.

Thanks.

I wuz kidding, neither do I :-)

I have something in common with Thom Yorke.....I too have a lazy eye.

hmmmmmm. No, I'm the one who wants to look like Thom Yorke!

Well that's not the nicest thing to say about yourself, Zelil. You don't look half bad to this pervert's eyes.  :)

(http://img419.imageshack.us/img419/8951/decrocker2ws.jpg)

Gainsbourg tribute? Been done, and probably better, by Mick Harvey.

Cat Power and Jarvis Cocker will make it worth buying alone.

Medeski, Martin, and Wood's rendition of Intoxicated Man is something to be feared.

Ian, I ascertained some information about that bootleg of Serge that I found, it's mostly a bunch of commercials and radio jingles that he produced/directed. There are only a few actual songs on there.

Saving this thread from the abyss at the bottom of the page. I have yet to find the refs in my Brigitte Bardot vidi.

It's about time someone else saved this thread! I think Ian's lost interest in the thread, though (can't say I blame him). There's only so much to discuss about Serge.

"Panpan Cucul" is a nice funk tune, though.

You know my German isnt so hot, but there is  message for you in the Sandbox.

I saw. My French ain't so hot either, but I appreciate the lyrics to New York USA. One of my favorite Serge tracks.

Just listening to "I am a child" by Buffalo Springfield, VERY Gainsbourg, or maybe its the other way around.

I'll have to listen to that track again.

BUMP this mother!