Monsieur David Bowie
It's been over a week since we said good-bye to Ziggy, so I thought to write about the French side of David Bowie...
Rumour has it that Jean Genet was the inspiration for this little number (below). This might sound daft, but I actually had a dream that I was listening to this song and the lyrics were 'Jean Genet'. No joke.
Anyway, if you don't know who Jean Genet is, just mention "The Balcony" in pub conversation, and you'll get away with it fo' sho'.
Brel and Bowie have two things in common. Their surname's both start with a 'B' and they both enjoyed leisurely rock climbing in the weekends.
Only joking, Bowie covered two of Brel's songs (the second being La Mort which was sung at Ziggy Stardust's last gig in 1973, I'll have you know!)
Here's an interesting French interview with Michel Drucker - basically a French Graham Norton, and according to Drucker's Wikipedia page, "He has been on screen for so long and so permanently (in various shows and on different networks, both public and private), that he once said that some people consider that he was included in the price of their TV sets."
I don't know what that means, but it sounds cool.
There's also an exclusive performance of 'Fashion' with Blur's Damon Albarn on French TV, and an advert he did for Vittel to tickle your pickle.
And to round things off, here's one of the first blogs I wrote for Culturethèque about four years ago (I sounded so innocent and cheesy)....
ZIGGY VS. CHOU
Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it’s Mr. Ziggy and Monsieur Chou!…dig out your glam-rock glitter lycra and pair it with une chemise bien taillée, as we head in disguise to the land of the eccentric! Follow this week’s comic strip with the superheroes of our time…
Supreme in manner yet polemic by nature, Lucien Ginsburg (1928-1991) and David Robert Jones (1947-present) walk as normal citizens by day, drinking tea or lighting one of many Gauloises cigarettes like you and I, but by night they transform into the alter-egos of another world.
SHEBAM!
Our first hero, Gainsbourg, saved our ears from the horrors of Les Gam’s and Michèle Torr. A man of many talents (playing the accordion and the clarinet to name but a few), charming the most beautiful side-kicks and having a common day job as a …painter! The extraordinary spectrum of his music, from jazz to rock to reggae to electronica (I could go on) makes us only weep with feeble attempts in the Music A-Level syllabus. He out does us with his philosophies of love and life all in le temps d’une chanson…
POW!
Introducing the one and only Jones: David Jones. Initially more of a classically trained fellow, a master of the jazzy Saxophone, donning a baroque wig playing the harpsichord, following the conductor playing the viola and cello and finally…the mellotron and the koto (I’m lost too). As the French proverb goes “Patience is bitter, but the fruit is sweet”, Bowie flew through 7 bands before becoming a hero, for more than one day
BLOP!
But wait, what is that in the sky? No, not the Bat-signal, it is the calling of experimental music. I know you musical lot out there are not impressed with my claims to this new found “eccentricity” as the Gainsbourg/Bowie era is flooded with the likes of Stravinsky, Shostakovich and Bernstein who have already been there and got the t-shirt. However, if we search behind every pair of Stravinky’s round glasses, Bowie’s blue eyeliners and Gainsbourg’s lighters we find the rebel grandfathers: from the mind-bending virtuoso of Debussy to the multi-genre unconventional Elgar.
WHIZZ!
To conclude, it would have been obvious to team Gainsbourg with “rhythm sticks” Ian Dury and Bowie with Claude François a.k.a. Clo-Clo but that would be merely comparing artistic appearance and shallow physique. What we need in our day and age is the superpower of Gainsbourg when he sings “dessous chique” without being vulgar and the feline, yet masculine, eyes of Bowie to bring back extravagance.
So go forth and grab your capes and dive into the comic strip... or lift off from ground control
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