Ace Songs for Europe #5: Vive La France

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

The good people of France choose their Eurovision song tonight. France have been rubbish for the past 2 years, but they've upped their game considerably this year and have invited lots of well known acts to participate. And the acts, they say yes. My favourite is by Les Fatals Picards. It is called L'amour a la francaise - Love by the French, or French Love, or something like that.

Reasons why it should win are:

  • It is jaunty, kooky bouncy guitar pop.
  • Apparently Les Fatals Picards are a punk band, although you wouldn't think it to look at them, or hear them. So quite how they are I don't know.

  • They seem to use humour a lot in their songs and music. Maybe they're a comedy punk band. Hurrah.

  • Les Fatals Picards have been 'on the go' for 7 years, and have 4 albums to their credit. According to one hastily BabelFish translated description of the band: "It is now a shock troop made up of five proud strapping men". Intriguing.

  • The song mixes English and French in a thoroughly endearing way. My French is rusty as a rusty bucket but I think they're singing about love clichés or some such. Apparently it's sung in a comedy American accent. I like that sound.

  • The whole sound is slow, jaunty and just a little My Star-ish.
Download: Les Fatals Picards - L'amour a la francaise


Another excellent song in the French selection is Vive Papa by Les Vedettes. Les Vedettes are a troupe of Belgian cheerleadering majorettes. Ace! They have throwing sticks, white boots, laces, brass band oompah music. The troupe is made up of actresses, dancers, designers and all sorts. They sound fabulous.

Their song Vive Papa! is written by someone important and indie called Katerine. Katerine is a man. The song apparently is about Pinochet. I don't know about the politics, but it sounds like a riot with Gwen Stefani (when she was good) leading The Pipettes into battle against the forces of mundane. This is quite ace.

Download: Les Vedettes - Vive Papa!

3 comments:

Jamie said...

Adrian! How can you say that 'Chacun pense à soi' was rubbish!

Adrian said...

Funnily enough, Chacun Pense a Soi won our vote at my Eurovision Party that night. Although I think that was because my friend Paul grabbed the voting sheet and started awarding them lots of high marks for the buff dancers.

Case in point: Cyprus + the men in dungarees came second.

Pål said...

The Les Fatals are fab! Very excited about this year's French song. Hoorah!