Why has Serge Gainsbourg crossed over to the English-speaking world
when so many of his contemporaries have remained largely confined
to the Francosphere? What is it about this unshaven provocateur
that so appeals to us? And who was the real Serge Gainsbourg
anyway? Was he the sensitive seducer and songwriting colossus of
the 60s and 70s? Was he Lucien Ginsburg, the son of Russian Jewish
refugees who had to wear a yellow star during the Nazi Occupation
of Paris? Or was he Gainsbarre, the deplorable, attention-seeking
drunk who shamelessly propositioned Whitney Houston on live TV?
Gainsbourg s cult has only grown since his death in 1991, and
Histoire de Melody Nelson is now regarded as a classic in France
and internationally. The 1971 album had only sold eighty thousand
copies by 1986 when it finally went gold fifteen years after its
release; its canonical elevation is a remarkable story, and there
are many more remarkable stories attached to all of Gainsbourg s
genre-defying, transgressive long-players. In Relax Baby Be Cool,
writer Jeremy Allen takes each studio album in turn while exploring
themes pertinent to Gainsbourg s life and music: jazz, performance,
provocation, appropriation, postmodernism, aesthetics,
metamorphosis, muses, Nazis, film and TV, Surrealism, fame, and
decline. French pop music is more popular than it s been since the
mid-90s, when the French touch was breaking. Gainsbourg s influence
has also been huge on alternative music: from Pulp to Massive
Attack, De La Soul to Danger Mouse, Black Grape to Iggy Pop, Luke
Vibert to Die Antwoord, Air to Kylie Minogue. This book is full of
new interviews from people who knew him, as well as younger artists
who ve discovered him long after his death. Contributors include
Jane Birkin, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Jacqueline Ginsburg (Gainsbourg
s sister), Anna Karina, Mike Patton, Etienne Daho, Sly Dunbar, Alan
Hawkshaw, Alan Parker, Jean-Claude Vannier, Tony Frank, Tony Allen,
Mick Harvey, Bertrand Burgalat, Acid Arab, Jehnny Beth, Alain
Chamfort, Metronomy, David Holmes, Blonde Redhead, Air, Sparks,
Will Oldham, and many more.
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