Le Punk Francais

While most of the readers of this blog are probably familiar with American and British punk music, as well as the weird amalgam of bands from 1979 on, once known as "new wave" but now called "post-punk," I suspect fewer are familiar with how these genres developed in France.

If this mid-90s French documentary (posted in four parts here on YouTube - sorry, en francais) is to be believed, French Punk's origins can be traced to 1974 in the form of stripped down retro-blues and rock-a-billy bands reacting to the wanking that had become mainstream rock. The documentary chooses to personify said wankery through clips of Pink Floyd, Genesis, the Rolling Stones, and France's own crap rock, as depicted by Joe Dassin performing his yacht-rock classic 'L'ete Indien (Indian Summer).' (Check that last link out, you won't be disappointed... I'll wait). The documentary suggests that by the time the Sex Pistols blew up in England there was a French scene waiting to embrace them, their music, and their style.

This is definitely true. Within a year of "punk music" becoming popular in the UK, France had fertile scenes based in Paris and Lyon. Why Lyon? Think Manchester. Lyon too is an industrial city which in the late 70s was suffering from a decline in employment prospects and an increased supply of restless youth. A few examples of this musical genre in its infancy. Observe Les Guilty Razors' "I Don't Wanna Be A Rich." Though this song was hugely influential in French punk, due to an error with their record company, the album it was on was never properly released in the 1970s (an error corrected in a 2006 re-issue). As a result, original vinyl pressings of this record are hyper-valuable. It is worth noting that most of this early French punk went unrecorded and some of these seminal bands name-dropped by those that came after only had a handful of singles released at all.



(Fun Fact: Two of the dudes from Guilty Razors went on to form Bandolero, the band that brought us this classic 80s euro-rap jam, Paris Latino)

Two other seminal French bands from this "Class of '77" school of punk deserve mention: Asphalt Jungle and Metal Urbain. A couple of songs from them below:

Asphalt Jungle - Polly Magoo

Metal Urbain - Paris Maquis. Fun Fact: this was the first record put out by the legendary Rough Trade label.



I would be remiss not to at least mention Alain Kan, basically France's equivalent of David Bowie, when writing about this era. Kan began his recording career in the mid-60s first as a crooner in the mold of Paul Anka. Within a few years his sound came to resemble the power-pop of his English counterparts. By 1975, he was openly gay AND openly aping Bowie's style (his bassist would actually go on to play on Iggy Pop's The Idiot, produced by Bowie, and the album Low). But damn if Kan's imitation doesn't work. On his album, Heuresement en France, on ne se drogue pas (Fortunately in France, we don't do drugs), he recorded what I consider to be a mini-masterpiece and arguably a link to the kind of ironic yet sincere music exemplified in the post-punk era, Speed My Speed, a song entirely composed of the names of drugs.



For his next project in 1977, Kan decided to create a punk band, Gazoline (later, Gasoline). Their second single - Killer Man - is, in my opinion, better than the "real" French punk that emerged more organically.



I've been somewhat picky with my selections here. French punk from this era is to a great extent very derivative of its American and English counterparts. If you have any doubt, check out Stinky Toys, a sub-Blondie punk/new wave act. Here is their performance of Birthday Party. No, you heard right, she's singing "Chinese chinese birthday party / Give me chinese birthday cake / Getting younger getting younger / Younger every da-a-ay /Gonna be a baby soon." And this was a couple of months before China announced the One Child policy. Stinky Toys was very close with Deng Xiaoping apparently.



Ok, to cleanse your musical pallette, I'll give you something with Serge Gainsbourg's fingerprints on it (oh you thought I could write a post on a hipster music blog about France and NOT mention him, au contraire mes amis). The rock-revival band Bijou had revived an old and somewhat obscure Gainsbourg tune, Les Papillons Noirs (Black Butterflies). Bijou's cover of the song became a hit and Gainsbourg, excited by the cover of what he considered a toss-off, began appearing with the band just to perform it. In the spirit of this new collaboration, Gainsbourg even wrote them a song, Betty Jane Rose, a poppy punk number. Of course, Gainsbourg was really ahead of his time even here. In an era when English punk musicians were flirting with Nazi imagery, Gainsbourg had already recorded an entire rock album about Nazi occupation.

Bijou - Betty Jane Rose

Alright, next time, I'll get into the music that came after this first wave of punk - post-punk francais!