2012 Presidential election

An absolutely massive weekend for France, and while the election result may have come as little surprise, its magnitude cannot be diminished.

It marks a turning point, and it will have implications on the French music scene as much as it will have an impact on every area of life in the Republic.

Things will settle, and it remains to be seen if change will be as radical as some expect or as fundamental as some fear. It should be remembered that the  result was actually quite close, it was no landslide, and Hollande will face a huge amount of social and political inertia.

Although the same could be said for Sarkozy and his right-wing predecessors. Each came to office with a promise of shaking the country up in a similar way to Margaret Thatcher in the UK. All failed in this ambition, and although each did manage to pass many an unpopular piece of legislation, the core Republican values were not transformed into an Anglo-Saxon free-market free for all.

A couple of other thoughts about the campaign. It was possible for an outsider - non native French speaker located outside France as I am - to folllow it like never before. Twitter and Facebook brought comment and developments in a minute-by-minute basis, opinion came from blogs and news sites - special credit to France 24 - and video could be quickly caught up with on YouTube.

A real success in new media coverage of the election.

But this certainly wasn't the picture on the traditional broadcast media. Again, the UK media followed the usual line of ignoring it completely until the first round of the election, then focusing on the National Front's vote. Their scripts were already written, and the narrative would be about another chapter in the rise of the European right, missing the significance of a Socialist president

We are always better informed about the US elections than we ever are about the French elections.

 I would guess that just about anyone in the UK asked to 'name the president' would answer 'Obama' before thinking to ask 'Which president?...'

And on the National Front vote, although disappointed to see them getting any popular support, it was heartening to see them completely collapse under any political pressure. Had Le Pen reciprocated to Sarkozy's disgusting overtures the political map of the country could be very different, with potentially a UMP president indebted to the FN. But the fascists fell apart under pressure due no doubt to a fatal combination of arrogance and stupidity.

But it's time for optimism and looking ahead at hopefully better times.

Apologies if this blog reads like one of the many political blogs that haunt the internet today. It's a music blog, but music doesn't exist in a vacuum and political circumstances shape music and the music of France is no different in that it is part of a wider political and cultural environment.

If nothing else, Carla Bruni will have more time to focus on her musical career.

François Hollande and Jay-Z

I earlier featured Nicolas Sarkozy's Deezer playlist that was released as part of the presidential election campaign, so to remove any accusation of political bias, I thought that François Hollande deserved a mention.

Hollande's latest campaign video is a bold move to capture the vote of the ethnic population and the resident of the banlieues, a potentially large electorate that is too frequently excluded from the political debate.

For all its well-meaning intent, it's pretty funny. There can't be many party political broadcasts that feature the word "motherfucker" so frequently. Hollande probably couldn't be whiter or less urban street credible if he tried, and that's before you consider the notion of him hanging with his crew of Jay-Z and Kanye West.

Wonder what they would make of the Parti Socialiste massive.

Worth noticing how little you actually see of "FH" in the video, with much more time being given to the voices and faces of voters.

Much of politics is about politicians winning over people who would normally be outside their sphere of influence, and at least he's trying.

There are still 11 days until the first round of voting. If a week in politics is a long time, there will certainly be more twists and turns before the final vote is cast.

Françoise Hardy - Comment te dire adieu

Politics can be a tricky business, particularly for those who are not actually politicians.

Françoise Hardy says she will leave France if Socialist candidate François Hollande winds this month's presidential election.

It's over Hollande's proposal to tax millionaires 75% of their salaries.

Hardy told Le Point magazine that the policy would leave her 'living in the street' and that she would have to move to London or New York if Hollande gets in.

London's a pretty welcoming place to the non-domiciled super rich, where the tax breaks to foreigners who can say they have a 'residency' outside the UK while they are domiciled there are only a little behind places like Monaco, making it a friendly place for many a Greek shipping magnate, Russian oligarch and Arab oil heir.

She told the magazine that she only earns a meagre 150,000 euros a year, a fact certain to win her friends in the difficult economic times.

I'm reminded of the story about how Phil Collins would leave the UK if the Labour Party won the 1992 UK general election. He moved to Switzerland two years later even though Labour didn't win.

Whether his move to the tax haven was related - Collins said it was not - and the quote was misunderstood - he said he's never been a Conservative Party supporter - the story certainly stuck and Phil Collins has never enjoyed the widespread success he had in the UK in the 1980s since.

However, I'm sure Collins, worth apparently £115m and one of the richest people in the UK music industry and still residing in Switzerland, is not hugely troubled.

Hardy, incidentally, made her first TV appearance in 1962 during an interlude in a programme reporting the results of a presidential election referendum. Charles de Gaulle was president at the time, and the referendum helped secure the powerful position that the president currently has in France.

Politics can indeed be a tricky business.

Sarkozy's Deezer playlist II

More on Nicolas Sarkozy on Deezer, with the publication of the playlist of sings suggested to him by his supporters on his Facebook.

It's a polite selection, unlikely to upset the voters too much, as conservative as you'd expect.

cat Stevens, Leonard Cohen, Dire Straits and Adele are there to show a bit of anglophone sophistication.

Some Sibelius to show he's the kind of guy that gets classical music, but not too much.

meanwhile there are plenty of the big names in French music, Mylene Farmer, Boris Vian, Francis Cabrel and Michel Sardou, who has come a long way from being banned by Charles de Gaulle.

La Marsaillese also makes an appearance, perhaps surprising that it wasn't there in his original playlist.

Kavinsky's Nightcall, from the Drive soundtrack, is probably the most contemporary track in the selection.

You could spend hours analysing the selection. I'm sure Team Sarko's experts already have.

Take Everybody Knows by Leonard Cohen, with the lyric: "Everybody knows the boat is leaking/everybody knows that the captain lied."

Or Michel Sardou's Le France, written from the point of view of the the ocean liner that no longer wants to be known by that name because France has let it down.

I suspect TV executives are already editing montage sequences with pictures of Sarko's campaign with some of these songs.

Sarkozy's Deezer playlist

With elections coming up fast, Sarko has sueednly woken up to the power of new media.

He's now on twitter, and on his facebook page announced a playlist of his "classics" was on Deezer.

He says that these are songs that he appreciates and which go with him wherever he goes.

It's - needless to say - a fairly conservative list. Some Johnny, some Elvis, some Brassens, which I'm sure will have the old anarchist spinning in his grave.

Some Carla Bruni there too.

Sarkoland by Trust is noticeably absent from the collection. So far. He's asked on facebook for recommendations from 'friends', and already attracted around a thousand comments.

Helpful suggestions inclde Gainsbourg's Requiem Pour Un Con. Be interesting to see what actually gets added to the playlist as the election campaign progresses.