Country : France Label : Universal Genres and styles : Pop / Singer-Songwriter Year : 2020

Oh ! Pardon tu dormais

· by Claude André

It’s not easy to write songs when you’ve been the muse of a holy monster like Gainsbourg. It’s not easy, after having carried part of his work around the world for years, to say to yourself, “It’s time for me to write too.” As a result, the most French of Britons got down to it and, what’s more, most of it was in Gainsbourg’s tongue.

The reference is not fortuitous, because if we’ve been hearing rather nice and very sympathetic things for a few months with the single “Les Jeux interdits”, which illustrates in a very catchy way the childhood of her daughters in Normandy in a very Gainsbourgian atmosphere, the album which finally arrived turns out to be at once grandiloquent, tragic, and insolent.

Produced and set to music by Étienne Daho and Jean-Louis Piérot, who have managed to magnify the wounded aspect of Birkin, who seems to be dancing here on the edge of the abyss, the whole seems to be both tinged with Daho’s English pop inspirations and sublimated by charged but successful orchestrations that evoke a permanent state of emergency. And with good reason, because Birkin evokes the tragic death of his daughter Kate in 2013, the ghosts of the past, love on the run, fear of cemeteries, a nursery rhyme dating back to the bubonic plague (!), a soldier killed during the Algerian war, sickly jealousy, or even love affairs that end with a “promise I won’t bother you anymore”.

Mission accomplished, the former muse turned creator can, with her head held high and moist eyes, stare at the ghost of the great “Chege”. And if Gainsbourg, for his part, turns over in his grave, it’ll probably be to listen more attentively.

Latest 360 Content

Dalit Hadass Warshaw, Boston Modern Orchestra Project / Gil Rose – Sirens

Dalit Hadass Warshaw, Boston Modern Orchestra Project / Gil Rose – Sirens

Howard Shore/Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France – Shore : Anthology

Howard Shore/Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France – Shore : Anthology

Quatuor Diotima – Boulez : Livre pour quatuor

Quatuor Diotima – Boulez : Livre pour quatuor

LMNL – Rainbow

LMNL – Rainbow

Strat Andriotis – Exits

Strat Andriotis – Exits

Richard Reed Parry – The Actor

Richard Reed Parry – The Actor

Tamara Stefanovich – Organised Delirium

Tamara Stefanovich – Organised Delirium

Galan Trio – Embrace

Galan Trio – Embrace

Jack Van Zandt – A Chaos of Light and Motion

Jack Van Zandt – A Chaos of Light and Motion

Tommy Crane – Reality Curated: Live at Ursa

Tommy Crane – Reality Curated: Live at Ursa

Thomas DeLio – Anti-paysage

Thomas DeLio – Anti-paysage

No Hay Banda – Steven Kazuo Takasugi : Il Teatro Rosso

No Hay Banda – Steven Kazuo Takasugi : Il Teatro Rosso

Vancouver Contemporary Orchestra; Vancouver Chamber Choir – Christopher Tyler Nickel : Mass; Te Deum

Vancouver Contemporary Orchestra; Vancouver Chamber Choir – Christopher Tyler Nickel : Mass; Te Deum

Hypercube – The Force for Good

Hypercube – The Force for Good

PUP – Who Will Look After the Dogs?

PUP – Who Will Look After the Dogs?

Duo AYA – Cycles

Duo AYA – Cycles

Papillon Social Club – Dur de la feuille

Papillon Social Club – Dur de la feuille

Coalescent Quartet – The Wall Between Us

Coalescent Quartet – The Wall Between Us

Samuel Bonnet Trio – Live in Harmony

Samuel Bonnet Trio – Live in Harmony

Marc-André Hamelin; Quatuor Takacs – Dvořák & Price : Piano Quintets

Marc-André Hamelin; Quatuor Takacs – Dvořák & Price : Piano Quintets

Oktopus – Brahms, Balkans & Bagels

Oktopus – Brahms, Balkans & Bagels

OCM: Bernstein and his “Side stories” in the spotlight

OCM: Bernstein and his “Side stories” in the spotlight

Abracadabra! Klô Pelgag is Back

Abracadabra! Klô Pelgag is Back

Subscribe to our newsletter