You wanted the best, you got the best

Yep, it's time for the round-up of the year. Lists, people, lists! What are the ten best French language albums of 2009 - No compilations, except for Gainsnord of course, no re-issues. Send me your top tens (you can wait after you heard Charlotte's album), you have until December 10. I will make a Final Top Ten before Christmas. That email address again: guuzbourg(at)gmail(dot)com

Beck & Charlotte Gainsbourg video

Charlotte Gainsbourg "Heaven Can Wait" from Beck Hansen on Vimeo.

Gainsnord (slight return)

Another video of the Gainsnord-presentation in Paradiso. You can see me hosting the night, see Serge van Duijnhoven performing his great (Dutch) poem about Gainsbourg and the lovely, lovely Geraldine singing Chatterton with West Hell 5.

Plastiscines

Here at FS headquarters, we like some screaming guitars. The combination of roaring amplifiers and good looking women is heavenly - French rock brought us Dolly, Manu, Vive la Fete and, earlier, Les Calamités. Plastiscines is an update of the latter, featuring four gorgeous women, singing in French and making music inspired by Ramones, Strokes and Libertines. On their new (second) album About Love, Katty Besnard and her friends sing mostly in English. Shame, for now they sound like Shampoo - a novelty act. The new cd sports three songs in French, Camera is the strongest. It's like a Yelle song without the electronica.

Plastiscines - Camera

see video for Barcelona here.

Cover art

Sélection de Lundi: Vanessa, 12 ans

Or was she already thirteen? 24 years ago, Vanessa Chantal Paradis recorded her first 45 tours, a post-La Boum ten-candy-bars nostalgia piece with nods to Little Richard and Gene Vincent, boogie piano and bap-shoo-ap chorus. The mastermind behind it was Jean-Louis Bergerin who’s still active in lots of nuits de rock’n’roll, but probably too modest to mention his association with the later superstar on his website. And though Vanessa indeed looked super sympa, not too many kids joined her surprise party that went more or less unheard down the drain in 1985. Even my niece (9) asked me how to get the aaaaawful song off her iPod. Tomorrow I’ll try with her younger sister again.

Vanessa Paradis – La magie des surprises parties

Serge meets the Wooden Shjips

Serge's Contact, written for Ms. Bardot, in a grand, highly spaced-out version by San Francisco's Wooden Shjips. "Take it." (Nino Ferrer)

Marianne Dissard (plus the boys on the bus)

Last night, I had the pleasure of spending some time with my favourite country-noir angel Marianne Dissard. She played the Paris Appelle festival in The Hague, her first concert in Holland (if I'm not mistaken), and also the first time we met. Four years after I put a song of hers on my first French compilation, and experiencing the advantages of social media (twitter, Myspace). But nothing beats a real kiss from Marianne. She played with a new band, last night was the first show of the tour. Bemused, me and the mrs saw Marianne explaining to guitarplayer Brian Lopez how to pronounce several French words from her songs (Brian also sings harmony) at dinner. I for one would be terribly nervous when I had to explain my songs to my band an hour before showtime (of course Brian, Geoff, Olivier and Sergio heard and played her songs before), but Marianne was carefree. She told me the story about how she came to Liverpool for three shows, and on the way to the venue the guy from the label told her that the duo she was supposed to play with, well, they broke up. So she had to do all shows with just an accoreon player. 'And it went great!', Marianne said.
Just as her show in The Hague was great. If you know her album L'Entredeux (if you don't, get it now! Heck, it's one of the greatest French albums of the decade!), you might expect a quiet, shy girl. None of that! Mrs Guuzbourg compared her to Edith Piaf, and there's some truth in that. Marianne's very expressive, communicative and (again, mrs Guuzbourg talking here) 'you get the feeling she has an urge to perform.'
So there. Find all dates for Marianne's European tour here. Below is a live track (with her former band) plus tracks by other projecst of most of her bandmembers.

Marianne Dissard - Les Draps Sourds (live in Tucson AZ)
Sergio Mendoza y la Orkesta - Las Calles de Tuscon (More on Sergio here)
B.Lopez - The Killing Moon (Echo & the Bunnymen cover) (More on B.Lopez here)
Mostly Bears - Melancholyism (More on MB here)