Inventing Chansonica

Without a doubt my favourite and most listened-to album of the moment is kooky French artist Camille's second album, Music Hole. Most middle class 30-somethings will have come across Camille on Nouvelle Vague's first album, on which she totally stole the show with her sexy rendition of 'Too Drunk to Fuck'. Playful and experimental, Camille's latest solo venture strikes a compelling balance between avant-garde electronica and tongue-in-cheek Vaudeville. Catchy numbers like 'Katie's Tea' - an ode to tea-drinking with which I can certainly identify, and 'Cats and Dogs', which cheekily suggests that "cats and dogs are not our friends, they just pretend, they just pretend" are interspersed with sweeping anthems such as the seductively soulful 'Kfir' and passionately secular 'Gospel with No Lord'. Unlike her previous album, Le Fil, Music Hole is sung mostly in English, with just the occasional sprinkling of French.

I was trying to describe Camille to a friend who had never heard her stuff, and came up with a whole new genre - Chansonica - which I'm pretty sure noone else has coined before. This freshly invented portmanteau can be used to refer to those artists who follow the classic French 'Chanson' tradition in terms of lyrics and singing style, but incorporate a more contemporary, electronic approach to their arrangements - Charlotte Gainsbourg, Emilie Simon, and even some later Serge Gainsbourg would all qualify. Thanks to the wonders of Last.fm tagging, I am currently introducing this wondrous musical concept to the wider world, hoping that it will catch on and lead to some more new discoveries for my budding Chansonica collection. Maybe I'll even make a mix-tape!

Camille is currently touring, with two UK dates coming up in October (London - 19th and Glasgow - 20th). I'm planning to catch her in Luxembourg in December during our usual pre-Christmas continental jaunt.

Photograph of Camille by *maya* on Flickr

The Art of the Lark Trap

Don't worry, this isn't a post about animal cruelty, or anything connected to the hunting or harming of birds in any way. As if! The only birds I plan to mention today are the imaginary ones that my dear friend, Let's call him 'Mr A', once convinced his young lady were the victims of an annual hunting event in the West Country. Not yet accustomed to her lover's mischievous sense of humour, the girl in question had been idly inquiring after some unusual looking pylons on the roadside, whilst driving down to his mother's house in Dorset. "Oh, those are the Lark traps", a deadpan 'Mr A' informed his trusting squeeze - going on to explain that the trapping of Larks was in fact an established local tradition. Perturbed by the very notion, she raised the subject later in the company of her future mother-in-law, and was mortified to learn that the whole thing had been an elaborate ruse at her expense. And so the Lark Trap was born.

Now in common usage amongst the friends and family of its original perpetrator, not to mention an increasing army of outside followers, 'Lark Trapping' as an idiom is a superior (in my opinion) and apt alternative to 'spinning a yarn'. Essentially the act of convincing another person with a plausible explanation for something clearly preposterous, it can also be applied to practical jokes in general. Whether or not 'Mr A' was consicously coining a phrase at the time of his original spontaneous yarn, we may never know. But I am happy to report that he continues to reel people in at any opportunity, and remains the undisputed king of the tradition to this day. So, rather than attempt some lame April Fool post, I decided that today would be the perfect occasion on which to pay tribute to the master fabricator himself, and maybe convert a few more Lark Trapping evangelists at the same time.

And while we're on the subejct of ridiculous avian-related stories, this BBC feature about flying penguins is worth forwarding onto your more gullible pals. Of course I never believed it for a second.