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Album review
Jacques Dutronc
France's Ultimate Lounge Lizard
Paris
23/05/2003 -
"It's an amazing toy which goes wham! boom! bang!" To use the words of one of Dutronc's own cult classics, Madame l'existence is an amazing work which has to rank as the singer's best album to date. In any case, certainly the best album he has recorded in 23 years since making the legendary Guerre et pets in collaboration with Serge Gainsbourg and Jacques Lanzmann. After going their separate ways for many years, Lanzmann and Dutronc have finally teamed up again for better or… better really. Lanzmann is responsible for the majority of musical gems on Madame l'existence (recorded between the singer's home in Corsica and Paris). And the combination of Lanzmann's verbal acrobatics and Dutronc's louche charm is, as ever, irresistibly seductive. On his last album – a greatest hits compilation cynically entitled 33 Years of Work – Dutronc had the dictionary definition of the word "worker" emblazoned across the cover. A gloriously tongue-in-cheek statement from an artist who brings out albums at the stately rhythm of one every seven or eight years! The notorious hedonist is now finally back in the news with Madame l’existence, his 13 th offering in 40 years.
After blowing out the candles on his 60th birthday cake on April 28th, Dutronc can still pride himself on being one of the most popular fixtures in French music fans' hearts. And the longer he takes to bring out an album the more they seem to love him! Hailed as the demi-god of swing, the picture of louche elegance with his dandy suits and eternal cigar, Dutronc has survived passing fads and musical fashions with ease. Made of the stuff of heroes – à la Gainsbourg, Ferrer and Coluche – Dutronc has the added bonus that he, unlike many of his fellow idols of the 60s, is still very much alive.
"I've never really taken any kind of position on things; my favourite position is lying down!" Dutronc once famously declared. But one might be forgiven for wondering whether Dutronc is as much of a dilettante as he likes to appear. Despite his proclivity for hedonism, the "man with the eternal cigar" has pursued equally successful careers in the music and film world, amassing an impressive collection of awards over the years (notably a "César" for his film work in 1992 and a "Victoire de la musique" the following year). Maintaining a discreet profile far from the glare of the media spotlights, Dutronc has protected his privacy over the years. But somehow he has still managed to become one of the rare French artists since Montand to alternate so successfully between the recording studio and the silver screen.
For a self-proclaimed hedonist there are always enough distractions on hand – his pop star wife and muse Françoise Hardy, the emerald terrain of his luxurious home in Monticello in Corsica and an endless supply of fine wines and Cuban cigars! So it is perhaps hardly surprising that Dutronc albums are notoriously long in the making. Dutronc's last studio album dates back to 1995 when the singer made a welcome comeback to the music world. (Apart from the live album Dutronc au Casino in 1992, the idling crooner had released nothing prior to that since CQFDutronc in 1987). Dutronc's twelfth album, Brèves rencontres, was not a great success, however. The only musical gems contained in its grooves were a cool folk number entitled A part çaand an upbeat duo with French pop king Etienne Daho, Tous les goûts sont dans ma nature.
Brèves rencontres was written in collaboration with David McNeil, Jean Fauque, Linda Lé and Dutronc's son, Thomas. And perhaps it was the sheer variety of songwriters involved which left it failing to hit the mark. After all, hasn't Dutronc always been famous for working with one close collaborator? It was Gainsbourg who penned the majority of the inimitable songs on his cult album, Guerre et pets (1980) and Lanzmann who was responsible for Dutronc's string of early hits: Et moi, et moi, et moi, Les Play-boys, J’aime les filles, l’Opportuniste and the unforgettable Il est cinq heures Paris s’éveille. It was Lanzmann's cynical, ironic, bitter-sweet barbs which conveyed the full force of Dutronc's panache.
Dutronc and Lanzmann first met in 1965, while the latter was the editor of Lui (the French equivalent of Playboy). Lanzmann's offices happened to be just above the famous Drugstore on the Champs-Elysées, which was the favourite hang-out of the "New Wave" generation. Lanzmann, who had honed his writing skills in the advertising world, injected catchy lyrics and subverted advertising jingles into the songs he penned for Dutronc's suave vocals. Dutronc, child of the "yéyé" generation and a contemporary of the Stones, went on to establish himself as the Third Musketeer of French rock, positioning himself alongside his twisting, pelvis-shaking peers Johnny (Hallyday) and Eddie (Mitchell). But the ex-guitarist and lead singer of "El Toro et les Cyclones" played a much wilder, anti-conformist role than Johnny or Eddie. Despite dressing as a lady-killer in elegant three-piece suits and incarnating the ideals of the sexual revolution, Dutronc remained steadfastly faithful to his long-time partner Françoise Hardy (whom he finally married in Corsica on 30 March 1981). Always choosing to swim against the tide and rock the establishment, Dutronc carved out an image for himself as the sort of "gentleman rogue" of French popular culture.
Meanwhile, on the album front Dutronc split from Lanzmann after the seminal Guerre et pets, the two Jacques finally deciding to go their separate ways. In a recent interview with Musique Info Hebdo, Dutronc declared, "I don't really know why we stopped working together. I guess one of the explanations on my side was my film career – and Jacques was always off trekking across the desert. But it was never an acrimonious split!" Lanzmann's explanation, published in the same magazine, put a slightly different spin on things: "I think Jacques was sort of trying to kill off the father figure !"
Now that his adolescent musical crisis is far behind him, Jacques is back in the music news with his 13 th album – unlucky for some, but not it appears for him! Shifting neatly between swirling violins and soft rock, the eleven tracks on Dutronc's new album feature synthesiser sequences and arrangements by Alain Lubrano (who has accompanied Françoise Hardy since the 90s). And interestingly enough, the album includes two nostalgic covers from the 50s - Un jour tu verras by Mouloudji and G.Van Parys (1954) and L’homme et l’enfant immortalised by Eddie Constantine in 1955.
And what of the lyric content on the new album by the notorious 60s radical ? Well, right from the title track, Madame l’existence – a sort of hallucinogenic blues meets Velvet Underground - Dutronc marks a return to the good old days, doing a sarcastic Gainsbourg-style talk-over/rant about the Republic. An echo of the famous L’opportuniste ! Meanwhile, La vie en live, a meditation on couch potatoes living vicariously through their TV screens, contains echoes of the legendary Et moi, et moi, et moi. And the cynical list of "bêtes noirs" enumerated in the ecologically-minded Face à la merdeare a direct kickback to Merde in France and Fais pas ci, fais pas ça. The song ends with a burst of raucous guitars and the derisive advertising slogan, Tout doit disparaître ("Everything must go !") as Dutronc rails against the catastrophic future humankind has in store for the planet.
Recorded against a background of soaring violins, Voulez-vous jouer marks a return to Gentleman cambrioleur and Dutronc's seductive crooning style on Les Play-boys. And the singer even throws in a dash of English for good measure, throwing his words in casually over soaring strings and catchy guitar riffs. Meanwhile, on the catchy little "neo-twist", L’air de rien, Dutronc slides his suave vocals over a barbed political and nihilist text. And on Transat en solitaire Dutronc joins up with his old songwriting friend David McNeil for the space of one song, for a delicious alliterative ode to Epicurianism. C’est peut-être ça is a timeless love song, tinged in the idyllic retro emotion of an Amelie Poulain France. Dutronc whistling a melody is always an audio pleasure – but when he hums Sainte Suzanne towards the end of his new album, accompanied by a simple acoustic guitar and a handful of violins, it's enough to make your skin tingle with pleasure !
Madame l'existence ends on a soft, drawn-out note with Dou dou dou, a nostalgic ballad infused with bitter-sweet lyrics and tender charm. Having fallen completely under the spell of the eleven wonderful songs on the album, we find ourselves facing the final question: is Monsieur Dutronc an actor who was born to sing or a singer born to act? Whatever the answer to that question, this brilliant collection of songs proves that crooning 60s radicals never go completely out of style !
Gerard Bar-David
Thank you for inviting us to your suite in this luxury hotel you seem to be so fond of… Yes, I am fond of it. I particularly like the bar. You meet a lot of people from the music world down there – too many for my liking, in fact. It used to be much more of a literary hang-out. Anyway, I’ve abandoned the bar now for my suite.
We’re going to be talking about your new album, Madame l’Existence – although maybe I should call it your latest offering. I hear you don’t much like the adjective "new"…
No, I don’t mind it. But I quite like it when people refer to an album as the last album by Jacques Dutronc – it sounds as if you’ll never have to make another one again which would suit me just fine !
On the song Transat en solitaire your songwriter David McNeil conjures up images of Ile de la Jatte, one of the chic-est spots in the Paris region. But your favourite spot seems to be another island, Corsica ?
Yes, I’ve got to the point where I’m spending more than half the year now. In fact, I don’t like setting off there now because I know returning will be a nightmare. Eight days can easily turn into eight months in Corsica. You get a totally different sense of time there and a totally different quality of life. People in Corsica operate on a totally different rhythm. The bottom line is, when you’ve found somewhere you feel good why bother giving yourself a hard time going anywhere else ?
Madame l’Existence came out on May 19th. Was this a day like any other for you ?
Yes, I have to admit it was - but I hope it was a special day for record-buyers !
I don’t know about buyers. Would you be amused to know your album’s a popular shoplifting item right now ?
Well, that's a good sign ! We’ve all stolen records at some point in our lives…
Amongst the songwriters on your new album there’s a certain David McNeil whom you describe as "being a very good writer – like all lazybones !" I believe you’ve known McNeil for 33 years now…
Yes, that’s right. He was a friend of Françoise (Hardy’s) to begin with. The good thing about McNeil is that he’s not a ‘song salesman’, he’s a real writer - and he’s got a good voice too !
The first time you and McNeil wrote together you were in the middle of doing a film in Africa and I believe he sent you his texts by satellite fax ? How did you go about working together this time round ?
Well, this time round the African fax was replaced by my office in Corsica…
Do you have a policy of non-communication with your songwriters ? McNeil claims that over the past 25 years you’ve only spoken to one another about ten times… I think it’s better that way, otherwise you go in to things too much. I prefer both of us to keep our spontaneity.
On the cover of your new album there’s a photo of you with a bar code and the label "Artist: Jacques Dutronc" stuck on your face. Is that the term which corresponds to you best ?
I don’t know. We’re all artists, or at least I hope we are! If artist sounds a bit pretentious you can bring it down a bit by saying "showbizz artist"… That’s what I had on my passport at one point. As far as the bar code goes, I felt that the photo of me surrounded by a halo of smoke would provoke the reaction "Oh no, here he goes again, hiding behind a cloud of smoke." The marketing director showed me a whole stack of projects for the cover and there was this one with the bar code. The only change I made was to have the bar code slightly crooked so it would look as if someone had stuck it on in a hurry !
People seem very happy to see you getting back together with Jacques Lanzmann. Apparently, Johnny Depp once called you and Lanzmann the original punks. Would you agree with that definition ?
I think he must have been influenced by Vanessa Paradis who I know is a fan. But I don’t think I’d describe us as punks… OK, if he likes to think of us like that that’s fine, I take it as a compliment. But we didn’t go round spitting on everything like punks, you know… We were ironic about things.
In 1991 Lanzmann got in touch with you and suggested you start writing together again to do a tribute to Serge Gainsbourg, but you didn’t accept…
Not for the tribute to Gainsbourg, no. I'm not into the idea of selling off his work at a knockdown price ! Gainsbourg’s very much alive in my memory – and in my life too, come to that – but I didn’t want to be involved in any kind of tribute, no way. Some stupid bastard will probably come along and do a Gainsbourg musical one day… They should get Arthur H to play him if they do… There’s an uncanny resemblance between the two !
Apparently you’ve never physically worked alongside Lanzmann – apart from a brief stint in Valberg in the 1960s ?
Valberg, yes, that's this little ski resort just above Nice. But we didn’t hang out together at all. We each had our own separate rooms and headed down to the bar at different times. That’s the only time I’ve ever worked with Jacques like that – and I don’t think we brought anything back from there either! Oh yes, there was one song - L'Hôtesse de l'air because I’d just met this air hostess…
But on the new album Lanzmann did come and work with you at your house in Monticello in Corsica…
Yes, that’s right. He set himself up down by the vegetable garden. The artistic director spent most of the time ferrying messages back and forth between the two of us while I was up at the bar… We ate out at night together every now and then and it was great, we talked about everything and anything other than songwriting. So that worked out really well.
I believe you were originally planning to do an album of cover versions. What happened to that ?
Well, it started out as an idea for a cover album with Tony Bennett. We were going to cover a series of classics and then do two or three of my songs as well. But for one reason and another the album didn’t happen and that gave everyone a bit of block about covers after that. Besides, everyone’s doing covers now… There are a couple of covers on the album, though – I kept Un jour tu verras (by Mouloudji) and L'Homme et l'Enfant. Mouloudji was a fantastic person. He was a real gentleman.
In the CD booklet accompanying the album there’s a photo-montage of a strange mixture of objects. Did you choose the objects ?
They’re elements of a work by Bernard Pras who did the famous portrait of me surrounded by all those objects…
…which, for those not familiar with the portrait, include a beer can, an LP, a cigar and a group of china cats…
My cats aren’t china !
How many cats do you have now ? 40 ?
45 !
In fact, can’t one of your cats be heard in the background on the final track on your new album ?
Yes, that’s right, the one I call "the boss !"
Do you have any plans to perform live any time soon ?
I don’t know. If I wanted to I’ve been offered quite a few dates - too many, in fact! But that’s all a bit energetic for me right now. Actually, I was thinking of arranging to be operated on live on stage. The curtain would go up and there I’d be having my appendix whipped out !
Alain Pilot
Translation : Julie Street
14/01/2010 -
