Soma: Nobody Hotter than God.

Another strong new release this week, with the band Soma releasing their second album Nobody Hotter than God.

In their official biography, the band quote John Lennon, according to whom French rock is like English wine, but they maintain that they are the exception that proves the rule.

Soma released their debut album Jewel and The Orchestra in 2010, and they've taken things a bit further with their second, a sharp collection of robust tunes.

The band recorded the new album in just 23 days at Vega studio in Carpentras with producer Bertrand Montandon. The album came after a period of months of intense rehearsal in drummer Thomas's home studio, the band sharpening their material ahead of capturing it in the studio.

It was mixed by Tony Hoffer, who previously worked with the likes of Beck, Suede, Phoenix and the Kook. Hoffer wanted to get involved after hearing their debut album, and given his track record he's certainly got his ears well atuned to what a modern rock band should sound like.

Soma have got dates around France in October, November and December.



To give a flavour of their new release, the band's released a video that sums it up in four minutes.

M83: Oblivion soundtrack

Anthony Gonzales, the man behind M83, is reported to be working on the soundtrack of a major Hollywood film.

He's working on the soundtrack of the SF movie Oblivion, according to The Playlist, a film starring Tom cruise.

The film is being directed by Joseph Kosinski, whose first major film was Tron Legacy.

Tron Legacy was soundtracked by Daft Punk, so it seems Kosinski is no stranger to the French music scene.

Gonzales recently moved to LA to pursue film soundtrack opportunities. His music's always had a filmic quality, and a science fiction film sounds a perfect vehicle for M83's electronic space-influenced sounds.

Kosinski says that he was working on Oblivion before Tron Legacy, and even then was listening to M83. While M83s last album Hurry Up I'm Dreaming established them to a huge audience, particularly in the USA, they've got an impressive back catalogue and Gonzales has proved himself as a first-rate musical visionary.

In some respects I can imagine M83 working well with film in a way like Krautrock electronic act Tangerine Dream did in the late 70s.

It isn't M83's first film soundtrack involvement, having worked on Gilles Marchand's L’Autre Monde (aka Black heaven) in 2010. That film included two new M83 songs and five previously released numbers.

Others to appear in Oblivion, currently in post-production, along with Tom Cruise are Morgan Freeman, Zoe Bell and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.

Oblivion is scheduled for release in 2013.

Vanessa Paradis & Johnny depp

With the news that Vanessa Paradis and Johnny Depp have split, I though a look at her musical career was in order.

Most of the focus in news coverage on their split is in on Johnny Depp, without her career getting much of a mention. Depp and Paradis were together for 14 years, and have two children together.

Despite being a huge star in France, with a music and film career, she remains best known in the UK for a single released in 1987 when she was 14.

It reached number one in France, and number three in the UK, and remains one of the best known French language songs in recent years.

While none of her other work made such a mark outside France, her music career has continued there with some considerable success.

Following her 1988 debut album M & J that featured Joe le Taxi, her 1990 Variations sur le même t'aime album saw her collaborating with Serge Gainsbourg. The song Dis-lui toi que je t'aime probably being the best known from the collection.

Her third, self-titled album, was released in 1992. It saw her working with her then-partner Lenny Kravitz, leading to songs like Be My Baby, a top ten hit in the UK and another of her best-known works.

She didn't release a studio album again until 2000's Bliss, which included input from Matthieu Chedid (best known as -M- ) Chedid would go on to win two Victoires de la Musique awards that same year for his own work.

Johnny Depp also made a musical contribution to the album. Depp's musical ventures included playing with Oasis and in the band P, which he formed with Gibby Haynes of the Butthole Surfers.

Bliss went on to be  a number one album in France, despite not having a hit single on a par with her previous albums.

Her next studio album came in 2007, with Divinidylle, her most recent studio work. The cover, a stylised portrait of her was pained by Johnny Depp. It again featured collaborations with Matthieu Chedid. It too was a number one in France.

Over and above her studio albums, there have been live albums, mostly coming out following a tour in support of her studio work, including Live in 1994, Au Zénith in 2001 and Divinidylle Tour in 2008. The most recent of these Une Nuit à Versailles came out in 2010 and featured acoustic interpretations of her work.

Most recently she recorded much of the soundtrack for the animation film A Monster in Paris, in which she also starred. The track La Seine - a collaboration with -M- a hit single for her in France.

Meanwhile, her acting career has seen her win a César Award for her part in Noce Blanche in '89 and a Genie Award and a Juntra Award for her part in 2011's Canadian film Café de Flore, with memorable parts along the way including The Girl on the Bridge (La Fille sur le pont) and the animation A Monster in Paris.

Chart: Sexion D'Assaut: Ma Direction

Another appearance in the top area of the French singles chart by rap collective Sexion D'Assaut, with the song Ma Direction.

It's another track from their album l'Apogée, released earlier this year and already a double platinum seller and number one album in France.

The previous track Avant qu'elle parte made the top five in France and number one in Belgium, a song dedicated to their mothers perhaps appealing as it did to an audience that would normally be outwith the regular hip hop scene.

The band with their huge number of personnel, sub groups and collaborations are a major force in French rap,  and while the releases under the Sexion D'Assaut name attract huge attention and sales, the members off the band maintain an active presence across France's hip hop scene.

 Probably the closest equivalent would be an act like the Wu Tang Clan, a band whose influence spread across the entire hip hop scene on account of not only the number of members but also their continuous work outwith the 'mother ship'

This week's top five singles in France, according to SNEP's disque en France website at http://www.disqueenfrance.com

1) Gotye: Somebody that I used to know
2) Gusttavo Lima: Balada
3) Carly Rae Jespen: Call me maybe
4) Tacabro: Tacata
5) Sexion D'Assaut: Ma Direction

Rétro: Charlotte Gainsbourg - Charlotte For Ever

A look back to an early release by Charlotte Gainsbourg, the track Charlotte For Ever from her debut album of the same name,

Interesting to look back to see just how she has progressed as an artist. Her early work was very much in the considerable shadow of her father, although I don't think it was necessarily his best work.

This track features him duetting with her. All the songs on the album were either written by Gainsbourg or co-written by him.

It's not an album I listen to frequently, I disliked it when I first heard it, although it has since grown on me.

I found much of the production and arrangement a bit dated. The album felt similar to other Gainsbourg project's in the late 80s / early 90s with female singers, whether Isabelle Adjani or Bambou,  quite good but ultimately quite disappointing.

However, tracks like this one make the album a worthy inclusion in a Gainsbourg collection, whether Serge or Charlotte.

There was a long period between her initial Charlotte For Ever album (1986) and 5.55 (2006), during which time she established herself as an actor.

Perhaps putting that time and distance between her debut album and her later career gave her the opportunity to be taken seriously as an artist without reference to her father's work, perhaps during that time she

Bernard Lavilliers: Utopia

 An interesting new vesion of a work by political artist Bernard Lavilliers.

He take is work that originally appeared on a 1977 album and bring it right into a mordern context with a contemporary urban soundscape surrounding the words.

The track Utopia appeared originally on his 15e Round album, this new version was re-recorded by Lavilliers, the music by Xavier Tribolet.

Lavilliers notes that the work, 40 years after it was written, remains valid.

During is long career Lavilliers has engaged with a variety of genres, from rock to reggae and Brazillian, so putting the work in a new frame is a natural progression.

The new version of the song is available as a free download from http://listn.to/bernardlavilliers

Review: Johnny Hallyday Le Roi de France

I've been a bit remiss in writing regular reviews in the blog, so time I put that to rights.

I've got a few releases that require my urgent attention and I'll get them on in the next few days.

In the meanwhile, a release that came out a couple of years ago is taking up much of my listening time, so I thought that a mention was well deserved.

The CD is Le Roi de France by Johnny Hallyday, a collectionm of his work from '66 - '69, and astonishingly it's the first compilation for an English-speaking audience, released by UK based specialist re-issue label RPM.

Johnny was at an interesting time in his career, faced with musical and social changes that could easily have rendered him irrelevant. Back then musical careers were expected to be short. No one thought rock 'n' roll would last. Teenage idols were not expected to age, they'd be replaced and forgotten once another craze came along.

But as this collection shows, Johnny had a firm grasp of what was going on in the music scene and a willingness to experiment and move on from where his career had taken him so far. Although an established act, there was no certainty that it would endure and his enthusiasm to embrace new sounds put him at the forefront of a rapidly-evolving music scene.

It's a period that is too often overlooked, coming as it does outwith the nostalgia for his early hits or his later status as France's biggest star.

There are many highlights on the CD, from his work with Page (Psychedelic and A Tout Casser) to his cover of Hush, (under the title Mal) long before Deep Purple made the track well known. To those of an English-speaking persuasion who might think of Hallyday as either a rock 'n' roll nostalgist, a mediocre translator of dated American music or as an easy listening rock crooner this collection is an absolute eye opener.

The tracks on the compilation show Hallyday to be apparently at ease with the massive changes going through the music scene at the time, enthusiastically embracing psychedelia, high energy garage rock and a heavy soul sound that suited his vocal style and also allowed him to express himself as a more mature artist.

It paid off, and Hallyday was, by the late 60s, the undisputed king of France. This collection explains to the English-speaking audience exactly how that happened.

But the sleeve notes suggest that it all came at a massive personal cost. A suicide attempt giving some indication of the pressure he was under.

Incidentally, while sleeve notes normally provide little more than a re-heat of a well-known hagiography, the sleeve notes with this edition actually illuminate much of the Hallyday story to an audience that doesn't have the familiarity with the subject matter nor the patience to wade through French language volumes.

For many in an English-speaking audience, Johnny remains a footnote in the biographies of other more familiar artists, whether Hendrix or Page. Tracks on the album feature Jimmy Page, along with members of the Small Faces and later Foreigner guitarist Mick Jones. This compilation shows that Johnny's involvement with figures like these didn't come out of nowhere and I suspect the musical respect went both ways.

If there's a measure of the success of a compilation, it's whether or not it provokes the listener into further exploration. On the strength of this release I realise my knowledge of the French psych scene is almost non-existent, and it's time to investigate further. Any suggestions welcome!

Vive le Roq: Second Birthday!

Today marks the second anniversary of the Vive le Roq blog, and while it seems like a while since I picked up digital pen and paper, it's been a busy time.

A brief article about Jean Ferrat following his death marked the beginning of the blog. True, I'd though about it for a while, and originally thought about launching it on June 21 to mark the fete de la musique but I thought I'd waited long enough and started the ball rolling.

At first I thought it would be a challenge to fill a blog every day with my ponderings and musings, and for the first year that was pretty much the case. Finding time, finding inspiration (!) amidst the day to day goings on of family and professional life seemed a challenge, but before too long I found my stride and things have been getting along just about fine.

The number of visitors has progressively grown, with last month being our busiest month so far. I've managed to keep up a pretty decent average number of posts, with a record of 27 posts in June last year. When you consider that in 2010 I managed a total of 24 for the entire year, that gives you some idea about how far we've come.

I've heard some great music and I've enjoyed sharing it. Hope you enjoy it.

If anything there's more that I could write about if I could find the time.

I've been almost overwhelmed by the sheer amount of quality French music that's coming out, never mind looking back at some of the key earlier releases.

One thing I have learned is that stories reflecting on the blog itself do not get as much traffic as the ones that celebrate music, which is probably exactly as it should be.

Thanks for dropping by and be sure to come back again regularly

Merci et à bientôt

jk

Festival: David Guetta and Emeli Sandé at T in the Park

With Emeli Sandé wining the Critics' Choice Brit Award earlier this week even before her debut album has been released, and confirmation that she is to play this year's T in the Park festival in Scotland, I thought it worth showing a clip of her with David Guetta, as they performed together at the NRJ Music awards.

Guetta has also been confirmed as playing at Scotland's biggest music event.

While headline acts include Snow Patrol, Kasabian and The Stone Roses, I reckon more people will be buying tickets on account of Guetta being on the bill.

This performance would have introduced Emeli Sandé to a huge French audience, Guetta having been nominated for two awards this year and being given the NRJ Award of Honour at the 2011 ceremony.

I spoke last month about how I love this track, probbaly my favourite on the Nothing But The Beat album, and certainly Sia's vocals add to this. The song had been earlier linked to Katy Perry and Mary J Blige, and it's great to hear this alternative take of it with one of Scotland's most

With Guetta and Sandé both playing T in the Park on the Saturday, I suppose a reprise of this performance may not be out of the question.

Editorial: February 2012

I'm very pleased to say it has been another record month for the Vive le roq French music blog, with more visitors than ever coming here in January.

I've upped the number of posts I've been making simply on account of the amount of great stuff I've been hearing and the rising profile of French music.

This month has seen Charlotte Gainsbourg on a UK current affairs TV programme and M83 being used as the music for a TV promo for the Olympic Games on the BBC, so I reckon that 2012 looks like it will be a vintage year for French music.

Some French releases ahve already been getting mainstream attention, whether Ms Gainsbourg or Frànçois & The Atlas Mountains whose album has just been released. Next month's Justice live dates will certainly continue the attention on French music.

I can be contacted by email at the address johnkilbride AT hotmail DOT com, with the spaces and the appropriate @ and . in the address.

Merci et à bientôt

jk

Charlotte Gainsbourg: Canal + Concert Privé

A quick heads up that Charlotte Gainsbourg is going to feature in a 60 minute TV special on canal+ on January 18.

The programme will feature a specially recorded concert, including duets with Connan Mockasin, Charlie Fink and Connor O'Brien.

There will also be an interview with Charlotte.

The programme is being broadcast on Canal+, at 22.35 on January 18, and will hopefully be available to watch on the canalplus.fr website.

Coeur de Pirate: Noël Blanc

Another track from the Noël! Noël!! Noël!!! album just because its the festive season, this time a French version of a well-known Christmas song interpreted by Coeur de Pirate.

It's another classy track from an album that's certainly head and shoulders above most festive collections, so no problem highlighting another track.

To those unfamiliar with Legrand, who at the age of 80 is perhaps from a different generation to most of those on the album, but as a musician he has been active from the 1950s, and over his lengthy career has worked on over 200 film soundtracks from the French nouvelle vague to musicals like Les Parapluies de Cherbourg as well as being a respected jazz musician in his own right.

He has worked with some of the biggest names on 20th century music, including Sinatra and Streisand, and some of his songs have gone on to be recognised as standards.

His film career has seen him working with some of the giants of cinema, such as Godard, Altman and Clint Eastwood.

He has also won three Oscars, including one for the best original song from a film, Windmills of Your Mind from the 1968 movie The Thomas Crown Affair.

Carla Bruni - Jolis Sapins

A chilled Xmas song by Carla Bruni, just getting into the relaxed mood for the holidays.

The song comes from the Noël ! Noël !! Noël !!! a collection arranged by Michel Legrande featuring performances by Mika, Jamie Cullum, Rufus Wainwright, Madeleine Peyroux, Iggy Pop, Imelda May, Ayo, Carla Bruni, Emilie Simon.

Also on the collection are -M- and Coeur de Pirate.

The collection was compiled to mark Lrgrande's 80th birthday and is a lush old school production with a big band and a relaxed jazzy feel.

If time permits I'll post a couple more tracks from this great collection

Vive le Roq: Album and Rétro release of the year

This year's I thought I would take a look back at some of the particularly impressive releases I've heard over the past 12 months.

First up, the Vive Le Roq album of the year.

Justice: Audio Video Disco

A release that combines contemporary dance electronica with the ambitions spirit of progressive rock, and sets the standard for contemporary music releases in 2011. Outstanding.

Runner up - M83: Hurry Up We're Dreaming

Rétro release of the year:

Alain Bashung: L'Homme à tête de chou

Posthumous releases often only succeed in diminishing the reputation of an artist, whereas this pays tribute both to Bashung and Gainsbourg and is a welcome addition to the body of work by two of France's most significant artists.

Runner up - Jacno Future (various artists)

OK, so perhaps not the Victoires de la Musique, but you have to start somewhere, and Justice is as good a place as an to start.

New: Emilie Simon - Mon Chevalier

French singer Emilie Simon releases her new album Franky Knight next month, ahead of which the video for the traeck Mon Chevalier has been released.

Several of the songs are to be featured on the new Audrey Tautou film La Délicatesse, due out at the end of December. The film stars Tautou and Francois Damiens and is basedon the book by David Foenkinos.

Its a great single, and while its cutting-edge production values locate it somewhere in the area inhabited by artists like Bjork, it's also classic song.

She's no stranger to film soundtracks, having recorded the (French) soundtrack for March of the Penguins in 2005, which won her a second Victoire de la Musique award for Best Film Soundtrack. It was also nominated for a César award.

Emilie Simon's self-titled debut album was released in 2003, winning her a Victoires de la Musique award the following year for Best Electronic Album. Her March of the Penguins soundtrack was released in 2005.

She followed this with Végétal in 2006, the same year as The Flower Book, a compilation of her first three releases intended for an English language audience. Végétal would also win another Victoire de la Musique award, for Best Electronic album.

Her forth album The Big Machine was largely an English language album, released in 2009.

More recently, on November 14 she was presented with the 2011 Sacem Grand Prix des musiques électroniques.

The Franky Knight album is due to be release in December and she is playing a few selected dates in France at Aix-en-Provence, Paris and Orléans

Rétro: Trust and AC/DC

If there is one band who I can point to as setting off my interest in French music, it has to be Trust.

During an early trip to France as a teenage metal fan, I heard a band that made me realise that not only was there a world of music outside the English speaking enclave, but some of those acts there were amazing.

Of course, for a teenage metal head, Trust were an obvious starting point, influenced as they were heavily by English speaking acts, AC/DC in particular.

I'll write more about Trust at some point. In the meantime, I'm thinking a lot about AC/DC with the opening of an exhibition about the band opening in Glasgow this weekend.

AC/DC were friends of Trust, and AC/DC's legendary vocalist Bon Scott duetted with Trust, on a version of Ride On recorded in 1980 in London just days before his death.

Its worth remembering that at the time AC/DC were not the massive multinational that they are today, and although very much in the premier league of rock bands, they were not so widely known outside a rock audience as they are today.

Trust recorded covers of Ride On on their 1979 debut album, as well as live versions of Problem Child and Live Wire recorded during their 1980 tour and released on their 1992 live album documenting that tour.

However, the Trust song Ton Dernier Acte stands as a powerful tribute to Scott, a close friend of Trust vocalist Bernie Bonvoisin. The song came out on the band's 1981 Marche ou Crève album. There was also an English language version, Your Last Gig, on the English language version of the album, re-named Savage.

The band are so infused by the spirit of AC/DC that it sounds exactly like something Bon Scott would have sung. It's not a question of imitation or impersonation, instead a genuine mark of respect forged by friendship and loss.

New: Justice - Audio, Video, Disco

A second single has been released by Justice, ahead of their album which is expected in October 24,

The song is the title track of the album, Audio, Video Disco.

It follows the release of Civilisation in March this year.

The album, on Because records, is certainly much anticipated, and if the two tracks that have been released so far are anything to go by it will certainly exceed expectations.

Consider how their 2007 debut has become one of the most influential French albums in recent years, it's surprising to think that this is only actually their second proper full album.

The band have been involved in producing and remixing other acts - collecting a Grammy for their remix of MGMT - and have released a live album and film and have toured extensively.

The new song marks a more rock orientated sound to the band, the band saying in an interview it was like "a progressive rock record, played by guys that don't know how to play."

When I wrote about Justice in March, I said: "Justice go far beyond any conventional understanding of what constitutes 'dance music', 'techno', 'house music' or 'club music', and inhabit an area that is both avant-garde and experimental but immediately understandable." I stand by it, and this new track confirms my opinion I reckon.

The video sets them in a more conventional rock setting, albeit in a highly stylised one. It's a far more complicated piece of video than it first appears.

The next chapter in the Justice story is being written, and yet again it looks like essential reading.

New: Louise Attaque - Du Monde Tout Autour

An unreleased track has surfaced by the band Louise Attaque, coming out as a single ahead of their forthcoming 'best of' compilation.

The Parisian band's 15-year career saw the release of three albums, their 1997 self-titled debut featuring songs like Léa, La Brune and Ton Invitation, as well as J't'Emmène Au Vent, all work that established them as one of the most significant names in French music in the 1990s.

They were inspired by left-field US rock band The Violent Femmes, which led not only to the band's name and Violent Femmes member Gordon Gano producing both their debut and second album Comme On A Dit.

The band split for a few years before their third, 2005's A Plus Crocodile, the band calling a halt to things a couple of years later.

Along the way they picked up a Victoire de la musique award in 1999 as band of the year, Rock Album of the Year for Comme on a dit in 2000 and Pop/rock Album of the Year in 2006 for A Plus Crocodile.

So while a career that only spanned three albums might not seem much for a 'best of' compilation, their three albums were so outstanding that there's no shortage of first-rate material to fit on one disc.

A new track by the band is certainly welcome, and while its unlikely that the band will reconvene on a more permanent basis, it shows that there's certainly a demand for them to do so should they ever want to.

The track Du Monde Tout Autour was recorded in the studio after singer/songwriter Gaëtan Roussel, now a solo artist who released his debut Ginger in 2010 got back together with his former bandmates to record the track.

The Best of compilation is released in October.

New: Arnaud Rebotini

A new previously unreleased track by electronic artist Arnaud Rebotini.

Rebotini has been active as a member of Black Strobe, an act formed in the late 90s that were very much influenced by industrial electronica bands like Front 242 and Nitzer Ebb, releasing their first album proper Burn Your Own Church in 2007. They have also worked on remix and production projects with a huge variety of artists including Depeche Mode, Bloc party, David Guetta and Rammstein.

Rebotini has remixed Noir Desir for their 1998 One Trip/One Noise album under the name Zend Avesta.

His solo debut Music Components was released in 2009, making full use of analogue synth equipment to produce and experimental electronics, recorded at his own studio over a period of three days.

His most recent album Someone Gave Me Religion came out in May this year,and two EPs were also released, Personal Dictator and All You Need is Techno, each of these releases featuring a variety of mixes of these tracks.

It's a brilliant album, modern but with the innovative spirit of earlier electronic music innovators.

Worth listening to on the strength of the track The First Thirteen Minutes of Love, a piece very much in keeping with work by synth pioneers of the 1970s like Tangerine Dream, although closer to their darker work on albums like Logos than their more upbeat soundtrack material they later became better known for.

Rebotini is performing live in Moscow on September 9 and in Hamburg on September 17.

Editorial: September 2011

A welcome to September and la rentrée for those lucky enough to be away for August.

It's been another busy few weeks on the blog, with again a record number of visitors over the last month, building on the visitors that came the previous month.

While a few posts were put up while I was away, it was great to see that a huge number of visitors were continuing to come to the site while I wasn't able to keep as close a watch over it as usual.

Still, there was plenty of material well worth featuring, both new and old, from the world of French music.

There are a few big releases in the pipeline for September, and I'll be keeping an eye on these.

I'll also be looking at a very interesting collection of vintage vinyl that has come my way, thanks to the family of a close friend who passed away some months ago. There are some absolute gems there from the more experimental and progressive areas of French music.

In the meantime, the amount of great French music that has been getting released has been amazing, and I've had the chance to hear some wonderful things.

As always I can be contacted by email on johnkilbrideAThotmailDOTcom.

Merci et à bientôt

jk