Friday's French music break - Les Victoires de la musique 2014

Yes, this week's Friday's French music break is a bit different as it's dedicated to this year's Victoires de la musique, France's equivalent of the Grammy Awards

And here's a thing to kick off. The very (French) group which cleaned up at the recent edition of the Grammys in Los Angeles, won't just be absent, they haven't even been nominated.

The motorbike helmeted duo (no, not François Hollande and his bodyguard) of Thomas Bangalter of Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo. aka Daft Punk, apparently declined the offer preferring to take their chances Stateside, where they picked up five awards including album ("Random access memories") and record ("Get lucky") of the year.

Organisers sent out a second invitation to the duo to perform but, as yet, there has been no reply.

So without arguably France's most successful international act at the moment, who has been persuaded to appear and who's up for a possible gong?

Well, you can see all the details here, but the most notable inclusion is not a French artist at all, but...ta da...Belgian Paul van Haver, better known by his stage name Stromae.

Stromae (screenshot from interview with Marie Drucker on France 2 television, August 2013)

The 28-year-old has picked up six nominations in four different categories (huh?) including (deep breath) Male artist of the year, Album of the year (the excellent "Racine carrée") and twice for Original song of the year and Video of the year (both times for "Papaoutai" and "Formidable").



Should he not pick up at least a couple of awards, those voting (which, in some categories include the general public) will need their heads examined.

And especially when you take a look at who he's up against for Original song of the year: ageing rocker Johnny Hallyday for "20 ans" and Maître Gims with "J'me tire de".

Nominated against Stromae in both Male artist of the year and Album of the year (for "Les chansons de l'innocence retrouvée" is Étienne Daho, whose low, almost whispered voice (in other words, he's not much of a singer) has been boring some of us with variations of the same song since the early 1980s.

Zaz, Vanessa Paradis (yet again) and peculiarly enough the male-female duo of Lilly Wood and the Prick (Nili Hadida and guitarist Benjamin Cotto) (winners of the 2011 Best newcomer award) are the three acts nominated in the category Best female artist of the year. Perhaps nobody realised that Cotto is a man and Lily Wood and the Prick are actually a group.




Lilly Wood and the Prick (screenshot from  Where I Want To Be (California) official video)

And there are strange things over in the Album revelation of the year category which includes HollySiz (Cécile Cassel) with "My name is", La Femme and their album "Psycho Tropical Berlin" as well as (here comes another silly name) Cats on trees (duo Nina Goern and Yohan Hennequin) with their album of the same name...er "Cats on Trees".

Yes it's Goern and Hennequin's debut album, but they've been performing together since 2007. Some revelation!

Anyway, the awards will be broadcast live on France 2 and transmitted on France Inter and France Bleu radio on February 14, in what promises to be its usually overdrawn luv-in with Virginie Guilhaume at the helm,

Yes, the same woman who hosted the whole shebang (with Laurent Ruquier) in 2013 and who also presents "Qui sera le prochain grand pâtissier?"
Enjoy!

Friday's French music break - Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers, "Get Lucky"

Friday's French music break this week comes from perhaps one of this country's most successful and, within their particular genre, influential groups - Daft Punk.

It's "Get Lucky", a song that in the words of a review in The New Yorker "lopes along in a soft disco thump, seductive but not ecstatic."

Daft Punk featuring Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers (on guitar) screenshot from YouTube Saturday Night Live video

Co-written by the duo that make up Daft Punk - Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo - "Get Lucky" also features Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers (remember Chic?).

Yes, it really did take four people to collaborate on a song with minimal lyrics.

But who cares? This is dance music after all. Plus it includes the unmistakable touch of Rodgers on guitar.

"Get Lucky" is the first track to be released (in perhaps the cleverest and most titillating of marketing campaigns) from Daft Punk's fourth studio album "Random Access Memories" which, although most reviewers recognise it as an attempt by the group to "ditch the electronic beats, house and techno that first elevated them to fame" still delivers - big time.

For Elisa Bray writing in The Independent, the album is one that takes the listener on a journey which "for all its musical twists and turns has its feet firmly on the dancefloor" (???).

While Will Hermes in Rolling Stone describes it as an "awesome ride" even if - after five years of waiting, it's nothing like the Electronic Dance Music set that everyone had been expecting.

Yes, a lot has been written about both the single and the album - and that was before either had been released.

Anyway they're both available now and for any lovers of dance music "Get Lucky" is definitely something to get your head bobbing, shoulders swinging and - maybe in the privacy of your own home - hips a-groovin'.

Given the song's release date, maybe those who choose France's entry for the Eurovision Song Contest should have thought about getting in touch with Bangalter and de Homem-Christo ahead of time.

After all, just look at the countries in which it has already charted at number one - Australia, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Hungary, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Switzerland and UK.

Oh well.

Enough words.

Enjoy.