Rétro - Johnny Hallyday and Carla Bruni

Sometimes there are moments in French music that are almost surreal when you look at them.

Case in point is this one, a duet by Johnny Hallyday, French rock 'n' roll icon who remains pretty well unknown outside the French-speaking world - duetting with Carla Bruni, the chanteuse and ex-model who is these days best known as the wife of President Sarkozy.

The song was originally written by Michel Berger and performed by Johnny in 1985 on the Rock 'n' Roll Attitude album.

Berger was the husband of and musical collaborator with France Gall between '74 and his death in 1992.

He was a singer-songwriter in his own right, and is best known in France for the rock opera Starmania, which was a massive hit. His work with France Gall re-established her career in the 70s and 80s, writing her best-known songs during this period.

As I said, this clip seems tremendously strange. The wife of the president duetting with a singer either seen as the living embodiment of Rock 'n' Roll or as a past-it ham who never really had any artistic merit to begin with and has gone downhill since is pretty strange concept to the non-French listener.

Stranger still is that it sounds pretty great as well.