•
Rating: "Talking about French rock is like talking about English wine", someone once said.
Well, English wine, in fact... no, thanks. No offense, of course. But no. I said no, really.
Instead...
...instead, French Rock, but French with a capital F, has managed to be as original and chameleonic as it has been in very few other places - around the globe.
Sure, finding competition worthy of people like Jacques Higelin wouldn't be easy - in any language, at any latitude. Better to reserve a special place for certain Characters - comparable to very little, beyond themselves. Seven Note masters who broke down every existing (or imaginary...?) barrier between two figures never actually so distinct: the chanteur and the comedién.
You might say: sure, but for the French this kind of Artist is nothing new. Hold on a moment.
For anyone wondering "who is he, in short...?", Higelin is many things together. He is an actor. Who has worked with some of the Greatest. He is a singer-songwriter who "interprets", one who acts over the notes. And when necessary, even outside - the notes. A "Cantattore" capable of transforming every song into a theatrical scenario - in which he is the main, but not always the only, character.
But two things, above all, carry his mark of uniqueness: the lyrics, born from a torrential imagination (yes, in some cases you can really say that Songwriting is Literature, indeed). And his "bacchic" and rapturous handling of the piano, honed through years spent in the theater-café circuit. Something that makes him a cross between the showman Aznavour and the rocker Johnny Hallyday, a Poet intoxicated with champagne and songs and Rock'n'Roll.
His first steps, actually, were taken when Rock was still very young.
But in '79 (because it's the year 1979 that interests us) Rock was already mature. It's true - it risked growing old and ending its days in homes of boredom and apathy, but Punk gave it a jolt. And in '79 Higelin invents yet another stunning move in his showman career, one that doesn't care about trends and prefers to do things his own way. He comes out with two twin but separate albums: "Champagne pour tout le monde" and "Caviar pour les autres". Two halves of the same phrase. Opening and closing of a conversation. Two albums born between France and Louisiana (the Cajun, the Mississippi, New Orleans and the Antilles a stone's throw away... after all, wasn't Louisiana once part of France, "some time ago"...?) - and two Names above all lifting the level of the cast: Mickey Finn, Guitar (also) for Nino Ferrer. And Bernard Paganotti, one who played bass for the Band of "such a" Christian Vander...
Only that, just to be even more baffling, the caviar is served BEFORE the champagne - by choice or by chance...? Never fully clarified. However, it so happens that the album which should have come second is released first. Today's listener doesn't worry about such matters: the two works are available on a single CD, in perfect (but illusory) continuity.
Because it's good to always keep in mind where the champagne ends, and where the caviar begins to be served.
The showman Higelin takes to the stage, against the backdrop of a piano keeping time and of a night that promises great things. Fireflies, goblins, elves, and fauns are the strange encounters the magic of this night presents him with. Or is it simply "the madness that accompanies him", the one that causes his mad visions. Or is it simply that he drank too much and it's late, but anyway there's time for another drink - "Champagne..."
...as the piano gives way to Caribbean percussion, with the showman imagining himself as a convict at forced labor in French Guiana ("Cayenne, c'est fini...")...
...before finding him among the country-flavored guitars of Tete en l'air or flying, aboard his airplane (Dans mon aéroplane blindé) - anxiety-inducing blues at high altitude, the music even louder than the engines.
Then you return to earth and dance, on the carnival disco of Ah la la quelle vie qu'cette vie (explosive bass), or plan an "attack on modesty" seeking incest with one's sister (before her husband arrives...), and Music and Theatre become a frenetic all-in-one.
You relax to the rhythm of cabaret ragtime (Hold Tight), admire the electric majesty of Rock by Captain Bloody Samurai, and are already standing for the ovation, but before the curtain falls comes the thunder of a Concorde tearing through the blue, and...sweet aftertaste, the total beauty of Vague à l'âme. And here words fail, instead of applause.
PAUSE.
The caviar is served.
And we resume to the beat of Rock: the "dixie" that makes you think of Little Feat and that takes you directly to Louisiana, aboard a saxophone (Mama Nouvelle Orléans), and the distorted one of the "Punk didn't pass in vain" series (Trois tonnes de TNT - more explosive than that...), and then...
...and then, suddenly, peace. Sweetness. Electric blue of neon lights. The slow arrives. C'est git une star. It's a Masterpiece.
New frenzy. Avec la rage en d'dans. The drums chasing "progressive" rhythms, the guitars raising their voices. In Beau, beau ou laid it's the piano that accelerates, to a boogie tempo. In between, the acoustic stripping of Je ne peux plus dire je t'aime. From shout to whisper.
I'm already so full that there's no need to add more. But after fragments of noise and electric piano instrumentals, the funk of Le fil à la patte du caméléon manages to say even more. The silence (and yes, this time the applause) falls only with the rain, at the end of On A Rainy Sunday Afternoon. Very sad slow blues. We've danced, we've drunk. But now the party is over.
"Talking about French rock is like talking about English wine", someone once said.
We'll talk about it again after taking a dip among the bubbles of this Champagne.
Cheers.
Loading comments slowly
