Histoire De Melody Nelson

Serge Gainsbourg - L' Homme à Tête de Chou (1976) {Mercury Records - Vinyl Replica Reissue 2011 Set, CD 7of12}
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© 2011 Mercury / Universal | 277 163-8
Rock / Progressive Rock / French Pop / International / Ethnic Music / Chanson

Even tolerant music fans shudder inwardly at the mention of the concept album, a largely prog rock genre that spawned many of the greatest aesthetic indiscretions of the '70s. L'Homme à Tête de Chou (The Man with the Cabbage Head) is a concept album and shares some of prog's general characteristics, but it's unlike anything emanating from rock's beardy depths. In the spirit of his 1971 masterpiece Histoire de Melody Nelson, Gainsbourg sets this album's brief tale amid a widescreen musical canvas. Whereas Melody Nelson was provocative without being explicit, the gravel-voiced Gallic lecher goes X-rated here – albeit without sacrificing his poetic élan.

L'Homme à tête de chou (Cabbage-Head Man), featuring the new character Marilou and sumptuous orchestral themes. Cabbage-Head Man is one of his nicknames, as it refers to his ears. Musically, L'homme à tête de chou turned out to be Gainsbourg's last LP in the English rock style he had favoured since the late 1960s.

This new full traces the career of Serge Gainsbourg interpreter. It returns to its original discography 1958-1991 since its first four 25 cm until the last albums, not to mention the titles published in 45s and duets where he put his voice. It is a large place to work for the cinema through a selection of songs and film scores. It also includes an audio CD archive including many rare and unpublished documents.

This mammoth five-disc set is a wide-ranging overview of Serge Gainsbourg's career as a songwriter, composer, and arranger. It also showcases his ability to make actual singers out of actresses and models – there are a few duets here with Brigitte Bardot, and others. Those who are encountering Gainsbourg for the first time will no doubt be intimidated by this set, it is a lovely package that moves basically in chronological order; but the three-disc De Gainsbourg à Gainsbarre set is more focused and a lot more affordable.

The 5 CD Box Set are presented in a roughly chronlogical order, with most tracks grouped by album, to provide a spectacular timeline of his career. Several of his albums are presented in near complete form–in the case of "Histoire de Melody Nelson," the whole thing is included on here. I would highly recommend this album to anyone who loves Gainsbourg but doesn't want to have to hunt down all of his albums individually.

Jean-Claude Vannier is best known in Europe (and all but unknown in the United States) as a celebrated composer of film scores, and as an arranger and producer of French pop music, he has worked with everyone from Brigitte Fontaine to Françoise Hardy to Johnny Hallyday. He is also known among music aficionados as the genius-arranger behind Serge Gainsbourg's classic concept LP Histoire de Melody Nelson. That recording, with its bizarre and otherworldly blend of musical and non-musical sources, which effortlessly wound rock, jazz, pop, found-object music, avant-garde, and even funk into a seamlessly, utterly disconcerting whole, has been sampled worldwide by hip-hop artists and DJs. L'Enfant Assasin des Mouches ("The Child Killer of the Flies") is Vannier's first solo recording, and an underground Francophone (and now worldwide) classic…