Nouvelle Vague, the French band that conquered the world with bossa nova covers of punk and new wave classics, return in time for summer with their third album, ‘3’. Led by producer/arrangers Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux and sung by a revolving cast of chanteuses, the group’s first two albums, ‘Nouvelle Vague’ (2004) and ‘Bande A Part’ (2006) have sold well over half-a-million copies. Not wishing to tinker with this winning formula, but evolving all the same, ‘3’ picks up where ‘Bande A Part’ left off, and this time they’re joined by some famous names.
On it you’ll encounter Depeche Mode’s Martin Gore singing ‘Master and Servant’ with Nouvelle Vague’s leading lady Melanie Pain; Ian McCulloch of Echo And The Bunnymen duetting with Melanie on ‘All My Colours’; Marina Celeste performing ‘Our Lips Are Sealed’ with Terry Hall of the Specials and Funboy Three (a Go-Go’s track penned by Hall); and Magazine’s ‘Parade’ sung by Barry Adamson and Nouvelle Vagues’s Nadeah Miranda.
Ian, Terry and Barry visited the studio in Paris to record. Martin sent his vocals from New York where Depeche Mode were making their latest album. “It was fantastic,” says Olivier, “but it was also frustrating to work with someone like Ian McCulloch: when you hear him singing in the studio you want to record 15 songs with this guy, not just the one. All these guys are so cool – they’re elegant, stylish, funny, they love music and they’re passionate.”
The other way ‘3’ differs from its predecessors is in the arrangements of the songs. Gone are the reggae and bossa nova interpretations. Instead, the songs are inspired by American country music and bluegrass. Nouvelle Vague transform Talking Heads’ ‘Road To Nowhere’ into a dusty bar-room shuffle, its head bowed as it traipses into the sunset after a long day working the land. ‘Heaven’ by Psychedlic Furs becomes a tender acoustic affair. A bluesy swagger through Gary Numan’s ‘Metal’ is sung with innocence and charm by Eloisia, a young Brazilian girl who could barely speak English and knew nothing of this music. Even ‘God Save The Queen’, once full of menace and bile, is fashioned into a romantic flutter. Add enchanting covers of Plastic Bertrand’s ‘Ca Plane Pour Moi’, Soft Cell’s ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’ and ‘So Lonely’ by The Police, and you have Nouvelle Vague’s strongest album to date.
On their debut, Nouvelle Vague took cherished tracks from the late 1970s and early 1980s by acts such as Joy Division, The Clash, The Cure, Depeche Mode and the Dead Kennedys and reworked them in a gentle bossa nova style. Sung by French female vocalists, some of whom had never heard the originals before, these cult hits had new life breathed into them, and their meanings became softly subverted. In French, Nouvelle Vague means ‘new wave’, and ‘bossa nova’ in Portuguese. Even the records’ sleeves wittily referenced the artwork for Jean Luc Godard’s early-’60s new-wave films.
“The original concept of Nouvelle Vague was to use young girl singers who don’t know the meaning of punk and post-punk music,” says Marc Collin, in whose Paris studio the records are made. “That way, they are bringing something new and totally fresh to the songs, and it really worked. So we kept doing it in this direction.”
The group expanded its musical palette on ‘Bande A Part’, adding touches of reggae, ska and blues to balmy readings of familiar numbers by Bauhaus, Blondie, Buzzcocks, New Order and Yazoo, among others. By this point, even hardcore fans who’d considered these easy-listening versions of punk staples to be sacrilege learned to enjoy Nouvelle Vague as a guilty pleasure. But what of the authors who wrote the original songs – what did these once-ruthless idealists think of Nouvelle Vague’s more fragrant approach?
Well, of those canvassed, all approved – thumbs up from Mick Jones of The Clash, Morrissey, The Undertones, Dead Kennedys and Killing Joke. And this led Olivier and Marc to the concept behind the third album: Nouvelle Vague performs duets with the original singers. The pair wrote a ‘dream’ list of the people they’d most like on the album and, when contacted, most said yes.
As with all Nouvelle Vague’s work, the real stars of the records and shows are the songs themselves. Says Olivier: “When it is a simple thing called a good song, you are always excited to record it in the studio and arrange it in a new way, and you are also excited to play it live in a simple way. The one important thing is that Nouvelle Vague are recording new versions and playing versions of absolutely fantastic songs.”
That’s Nouvelle Vague: they take the songs that you adore and make you fall in love with them all over again.
On it you’ll encounter Depeche Mode’s Martin Gore singing ‘Master and Servant’ with Nouvelle Vague’s leading lady Melanie Pain; Ian McCulloch of Echo And The Bunnymen duetting with Melanie on ‘All My Colours’; Marina Celeste performing ‘Our Lips Are Sealed’ with Terry Hall of the Specials and Funboy Three (a Go-Go’s track penned by Hall); and Magazine’s ‘Parade’ sung by Barry Adamson and Nouvelle Vagues’s Nadeah Miranda.
Ian, Terry and Barry visited the studio in Paris to record. Martin sent his vocals from New York where Depeche Mode were making their latest album. “It was fantastic,” says Olivier, “but it was also frustrating to work with someone like Ian McCulloch: when you hear him singing in the studio you want to record 15 songs with this guy, not just the one. All these guys are so cool – they’re elegant, stylish, funny, they love music and they’re passionate.”
The other way ‘3’ differs from its predecessors is in the arrangements of the songs. Gone are the reggae and bossa nova interpretations. Instead, the songs are inspired by American country music and bluegrass. Nouvelle Vague transform Talking Heads’ ‘Road To Nowhere’ into a dusty bar-room shuffle, its head bowed as it traipses into the sunset after a long day working the land. ‘Heaven’ by Psychedlic Furs becomes a tender acoustic affair. A bluesy swagger through Gary Numan’s ‘Metal’ is sung with innocence and charm by Eloisia, a young Brazilian girl who could barely speak English and knew nothing of this music. Even ‘God Save The Queen’, once full of menace and bile, is fashioned into a romantic flutter. Add enchanting covers of Plastic Bertrand’s ‘Ca Plane Pour Moi’, Soft Cell’s ‘Say Hello Wave Goodbye’ and ‘So Lonely’ by The Police, and you have Nouvelle Vague’s strongest album to date.
On their debut, Nouvelle Vague took cherished tracks from the late 1970s and early 1980s by acts such as Joy Division, The Clash, The Cure, Depeche Mode and the Dead Kennedys and reworked them in a gentle bossa nova style. Sung by French female vocalists, some of whom had never heard the originals before, these cult hits had new life breathed into them, and their meanings became softly subverted. In French, Nouvelle Vague means ‘new wave’, and ‘bossa nova’ in Portuguese. Even the records’ sleeves wittily referenced the artwork for Jean Luc Godard’s early-’60s new-wave films.
“The original concept of Nouvelle Vague was to use young girl singers who don’t know the meaning of punk and post-punk music,” says Marc Collin, in whose Paris studio the records are made. “That way, they are bringing something new and totally fresh to the songs, and it really worked. So we kept doing it in this direction.”
The group expanded its musical palette on ‘Bande A Part’, adding touches of reggae, ska and blues to balmy readings of familiar numbers by Bauhaus, Blondie, Buzzcocks, New Order and Yazoo, among others. By this point, even hardcore fans who’d considered these easy-listening versions of punk staples to be sacrilege learned to enjoy Nouvelle Vague as a guilty pleasure. But what of the authors who wrote the original songs – what did these once-ruthless idealists think of Nouvelle Vague’s more fragrant approach?
Well, of those canvassed, all approved – thumbs up from Mick Jones of The Clash, Morrissey, The Undertones, Dead Kennedys and Killing Joke. And this led Olivier and Marc to the concept behind the third album: Nouvelle Vague performs duets with the original singers. The pair wrote a ‘dream’ list of the people they’d most like on the album and, when contacted, most said yes.
As with all Nouvelle Vague’s work, the real stars of the records and shows are the songs themselves. Says Olivier: “When it is a simple thing called a good song, you are always excited to record it in the studio and arrange it in a new way, and you are also excited to play it live in a simple way. The one important thing is that Nouvelle Vague are recording new versions and playing versions of absolutely fantastic songs.”
That’s Nouvelle Vague: they take the songs that you adore and make you fall in love with them all over again.
