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Album review
Sylvie Vartan
Nouvelle Vague
Paris
29/08/2007 -
Sylvie Vartan’s new album opens with the jaunty wake-up call Il est cinq heures, Paris s’éveille, the Jacques Dutronc hit that uninspired radio presenters still regularly roll out on early-morning shows in France. Vartan’s latest American-style covers album, boosted by superb studio production and all the latest hi-tech equipment, has the same element of predictability to it, and yet Nouvelle Vague pulls listeners in with a powerfully seductive force, compelling them to listen right to the very last note of the very last track. And perhaps this is because no-one other than Sylvie Vartan could have revived these French and Anglo-Saxon pop classics from the ‘60s and early ‘70s with quite the same laidback vocals and sense of conviction.
Sylvie’s Nouvelle Vague puts a certain bossa and even, at times, Cuban spin on these pop classics from yesteryear, brass and percussion instruments adding a golden touch to the lead vocals and gloriously deep backing vocals (also, thanks to a trick of technology, performed by Sylvie herself). The former 60s idol can raise her voice to a lighter ethereal level when required, though, as she proves on Le Temps des amours, a song Jacques Dutronc originally penned for Françoise Hardy. Apparently Hardy, the famous performer of Tous les garçons et les filles, was overjoyed to hear that her friend Sylvie was planning to do a new cover of Le Temps des amours as she hated her own version of the song.
Moving into another register entirely, Sylvie also revives Dream A Little Dream of Me (a song already adapted into French by Enzo Enzo as Les Yeux ouverts). Sylvie’s delicate reworking of the song casts new light on the Mama Cass original as well as showing off her own vocal skills. While Dream A Little Dream of Me is one of the high points of Nouvelle Vague, the unfortunate Ya ya twiste stands as one of its lows. The musical arrangements tend to overwhelm Sylvie’s vocals (with just the right amount of sixties reverb’ at the end of the verse), spoiling what could have been a wonderful track. In fact, throughout the album, it is the songs that have been the least arranged and orchestrally retouched that prove to be the most moving. Sylvie’s take on Suzanne and Ruby Tuesday are outstanding and her version of The Four Tops’ classic Reach Out I’ll Be There, sung in French (J’attendrai) like Claude François, is all the more powerful stripped of special effects.
Cover versions are a notoriously tricky business, but Sylvie Vartan has risen to the challenge in style, reviving the catchy pop hits that marked her generation. Take a listen to her excellent Drive My Car, an evocation of Saturday nights at the drive-in conjuring up all the atmosphere of George Lucas’s American Graffiti. And marvel at the song’s solid rock riffs and Sylvie’s equally solid vocals coupled with perfect accentuation. The other pleasant surprise on Nouvelle Vague is to find so many songs so rarely heard in recent years reappearing as if by miracle, namely a French version of Ronnie Bird’s Chante with its psychedelic rock hook (eerily reminiscent of Beck’s Devils Haircut) and The Monkees' I’m A Believer, this time recorded in English.
Nouvelle Vague ends with a slow drawn-out version of Souvenirs souvenirs, arranged gospel-style to let Sylvie’s thick, matte vocals shine to the full. A fitting end to this musical trip down memory lane! Sylvie Vartan’s tribute album is sure to strike a chord with aficionados of France’s ‘yéyé’ years and fans of the swinging sixties worldwide.
Sylvie Vartan Nouvelle Vague (Mercury/Universal) 2007
David Glaser
Translation : Julie Street
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