Petula Clark
Chariot

Can what I am beginning to write be defined as a review? I don't know, maybe, maybe not, the only certainty is that in this case the term "review" sounds really bad to me: I mean, me, reviewing "Chariot"? And why not the Taj Mahal, or the Odyssey, or Giorgione's Tempest? What do you say, am I exaggerating? Probably yes, but this is my feeling: certain things I cannot review, I am not capable for a whole series of reasons, at most I can celebrate them, I can tell them according to my sensitivity, my ideas and my point of view; let's call it an experiment then, or a vainglorious manifesto if you prefer.

These two minutes and twenty seconds of music are, in my opinion, one of the greatest icons of a distant, fascinating era, and in many aspects sadly forgotten today. "Chariot" was born as an instrumental in 1961 by two French composers, Franck Pourcel and Paul Mauriat, but such an overwhelming melody cannot remain an end in itself, it needs lyrics and a worthy performer to reach fullness, to reach the audience, and who better than Petula Clark, with her fresh, enthusiastic, and crystal-clear voice? She was the first, many others will follow, but the original, the most beautiful, the one that counts remains hers, which in 1962 reached the top of the French hit parade, consecrating her as a star of the first magnitude in the European pop scene of those years. And this "Chariot" is not just any chariot, it is THE chariot, Apollo's chariot, which crosses the skies carrying the sun with it. And with such a vehicle, it's obvious that the Earth has no more frontiers; love, travel, the sky, the moon, and the stars are the blurred and indistinct contours of a utopian idyll, of a delirium of omnipotence, which thanks to the power of music becomes a wonderful reality, at least for about two minutes and twenty seconds.

And this is one of the most beautiful songs, indeed, the greatest of all time: a universal greatness, open to everyone, it can be somewhat snobbishly defined as easy listening, you can add all the ifs, buts, and howevers of this world, but "Chariot" is a non-negotiable value, and even great artists, particularly dear to me, think so, who have been inspired, who have paid homage to the Pop of those years with wonderfully respectful covers of the originals, who have introduced me to this type of sound, and for this, I will never stop thanking them; thank you Marc, thank you Etienne, thank you Thomas. "Chariot" is History, in a broad sense and obviously also of its era, the '60s were also this, indeed, I could even dare to say they were mainly this, I write with a proud and complacent grin, I write it with absolute conviction, even at the risk of being considered "reactionary".