OPO: Jacques Brel

Laisse-moi devenir
L'ombre de ton ombre
L'ombre de ta main
L'ombre de ton chien

Let me become
The shadow of your shadow
The shadow of your hand
The shadow of your dog

(all this just to be near the beloved who wants to leave him)

i would have been the shadow of your shadow
if you would have kept me by your side.

*sniff, sniff... reaches for kleenex brand tissue

Le Moribond

hard to pick. j'arrive?

Les Flamandes

Jackie!

Died 30 years ago today.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques_Brel

Brel always looks like he's had a night out on the town, got beat up, and hasn't shaken off the whiskey yet.

Let's try that again.

Deleting videos, are they? :-(

Youtube search results for Brel, Amsterdam.

Incredible performer.

haven't heard a whole lot of brel, but I always liked "carousel"

or in french "La valse à mille temps"

Naked as sin, an army towel
Covering my belly
Some of us blush, somehow
Knees turning to jelly
Next, next
I was still just a kid
There were a hundred like me
I followed a naked body
A naked body followed me
next, next
I was still just a kid
When my innocence was lost
In a mobile army whorehouse
Gift for the army, free of cost
Next, next
Me, I really would have liked
A little touch of tenderness
Maybe a word, a smile
An hour of happiness
But, next, next
Oh, it wasn't so tragic
The high heavens did not fall
But how much of that time
I hated being there at all
Next, next
Now I always will recall
The brothel truck, the flying flags
The queer lieutenant who slapped
Our asses as if we were fags
Next, next
I swear on the wet head
Of my first case of gonorrhea
It is his ugly voice
That I forever hear
Next, next
That voice that stinks of whiskey
Of corpses and of mud
It is the voice of nations
It is the thick voice of blood
Next, next
And since the each woman
I have taken to bed
Seems to laugh in my arms
To whisper through my head
Next, next
All the naked and the dead
Should hold each other's hands
As they watch me scream at night
In a dream no one understands
Next, next
And when I am not screaming
In a voice grown dry and hollow
I stand on endless naked lines
Of the following and the followed
Next, next
One day I'll cut my legs off
Or burn myself alive
Anything, I'll do anything
To get out of line to survive
Not ever to be next
Not ever to be next.

I love Brel but the song I find myself hankering for more than any other has to be Vesoul, followed closely by Les Bourgeois.

I swear on the wet head
Of my first case of gonorrhea

tmi or new catchphrase

I mostly know Brel through "Alive and Well and Living In Paris." I've long owned and loved the film soundtrack, but I think common wisdom is that the original cast recording is far superior. Opinions, anyone?

Pricey and hard to find, last time I looked.

Don't know enough about Brel to OPO, but Youtube always has a wealth of amazing stuff. What I really want to know about Brel is, are the original lyrics of 'La chanson de Jacky' as nuts as the Schuman translation? What's the song about? Who is the character?

"Les Vieux"
― Amateurist (amateurist), Wednesday, March 12, 2003 11:45 PM (5 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

"Avec Élégance"

are the original lyrics of 'La chanson de Jacky' as nuts as the Schuman translation?

Don't know the translation but it's quite colroful in French. The song is obviously about nostalgia for one's youth as sung by an ageing singer who may or may not be Brel or a character he has invented.

Qu'avons-nous fait, bonnes gens

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/252/798875.jpg

my favorite is 'Mijn Vlakke Land" even though it's been taken up by some weird Flemish extremists (de Vlaamse Blok) it makes me think so much of how the lowlands really are it's almost creepy. So melancholy.

Wanneer de regen daalt op straten, pleinen, perken,
op dak en torenspits van hemelhoge kerken,
die in dit vlakke land de enige bergen zijn,
wanneer onder de wolken mensen dwergen zijn,
wanneer de dagen gaan in domme regelmaat
en bolle oostenwind het land en vlakker slaat,
dan wacht mijn land...Mijn vlakke land...

It means something like:

When the raindrops fall on streets, squares, parks
on roofs and clocktowers or heavenshigh churches
when under the clouds the people are like dwarves
that in this flat land are the only mountains
when the days go by in silence regularly
a strong easterly wind makes the land even flatter
then my land waits...my flat land

I'd always thought I recognised Le Moribond from somewhere, then I realised and Googled, and yes, it's the original version of Seasons In The Sun (which was thoroughly reworked by Terry Jacks).

yeah the original is about 100x better both lyrically and musically

OP3: Saint Pierre, On N'oublie Rien, Le Bon Dieu

So far over the top, it runs the risk of bathos, but ends up even scarier IM

<object style="height: 344px; width: 425px"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/zqx5j-FuqeI";><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/zqx5j-FuqeI"; type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" allowScriptAccess="always" width="425" height="344"></object>

Arghhh....

try this

"Jef" came on random play this morning and I nearly had a mini-breakdown on the train.

Do not listen to Jacques Brel when tired and emotional on public transport.

Slightly disappointed now that I look up the lyrics that the first verse doesn't refer to "blonde forces" rather than "a false blonde".

Non Jef t'es pas tout seul
No Jeff, don't think that you're alone
Mais arrête de pleurer
Please try not to cry
Comme ça devant tout le monde
In front of everyone
Parce qu'une demi-vieille
Because a middle-aged
Parce qu'une fausse blonde
Because a false-blonde
T'a relaissé tomber
Has left you to fall

"Mon enfance"

... at the moment that is. Have come to the conclusion that Brel has written more songs I like than any other songwriter.

OPO for Brel is a ludicrous proposition. Maybe "La Chanson des Vieux Amants", maybe something else.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gosgf3nWjjs

This aired again few weeks ago, great recording of a '64 performance, his last in the Netherlands.

NEXT!!

"Jef" came on random play this morning and I nearly had a mini-breakdown on the train.

Whereas David Bowie wrote "Rock 'n' Roll Suicide" when he heard it

Is that true? Honestly, that song is just too much.

I'm really enjoying "Un peut de Tendresse" at the moment. It's really sweet and relatively light by Brel's standards.

listening to "Vivre debout". it is my favourite.

It's really hard to translate Brel into English because a lot of the subtle nuance and colloquialisms get lost.

I had a go at translating one of my favourites, "Ces Gens La". Took a few stylistic liberties, and there are some turns-of-phrase that simply don't make sense in English, but nevertheless I thought I'd share it here for prosperity:

First off,
First off, there’s the eldest
A right melon
With a big nose
Who can barely remember his own name, Sir
Cos he drinks so much
So much he has drunk
Does nothing all day with his ten digits
And even then, can’t be bothered

He walks around leathered
Like he’s some sort of king
Gets himself soused every night
On bad wine
And we find him next morning
Dozing off in church
Stiff as a buttress
Pale as an Easter candle
Babbling on and on
With those wobbly eyes

I tell you what, Sir
With these people,
We don’t think of them
We don’t think,
We pray!

Then you’ve got the other one
Bits of carrot in his hair
Who’s barely seen a comb
And is as pleasant as ringworm
But would give the shirt off his back
To help the contented poor
You know he married that Denise?
The girl from the town,
Or at least, the next town along

And on top of that
He goes about his business
With his little hat
And his little coat
In his little car
Giving it ‘all that’
Except he’s not ‘all that’ at all
You should never play the rich man
When you haven’t got a dime

I tell you what, Sir
With these people
They’re not living, Sir
They’re not living, they’re cheating

Then there’s the rest of them:

The mum who never says anything
Or, at least, never anything important

And from dusk til dawn
Obscuring his handsome, saint-like face
And his oak-like frame
The Dad’s moustache
That looks like it slipped off in a fall
He watches the rest of his herd
As he guzzles-down cold soup
With a great big “shlurp”
With a great big “shlurp-shlurp”

Then you’ve got the old biddy
Who shakes all day
And who they’re just waiting to cark it
Cos she’s th one with all the dough
They don’t even listen to her
Or to the stories those poor hands try to tell

I’ve got to tell you, Sir
With these folks
We don’t like to chat about them
We don’t chat, we count

And then…. And then
And then there’s Frida
Who’s as pretty as a sunbeam
And who loves me the same way
As I love her - Frida!

We’ll often tell each other
That we’ll have a house
Studded with a ton of windows
And almost no walls
And we’ll live there inside it
And it’ll be so great there
And if we’re still not quite sure
It’s still a definite “maybe”
Because the others don’t like it
Because the others don’t want it

The others, they’re saying
That she’s out of my league
That I’m only just good enough
To disembowel cats
Now, I’ve never killed a cat
Or at least, it’s been a good while
Or else I’ve forgotten
Or, well, it didn’t smell good
At any rate, they’re against it

Sometimes when we meet up
Accidentally-on-purpose
With damp eyes
She'll say that she’ll leave
She says that she'll follow me
And for just an instant
Just for an instant, Sir
Yes, at that very instant
Me, I believe her
For just an instant, Sir

Because with those people
You don’t just leave, sir
You don’t just leave
You don’t just leave

Anyway, it’s getting late, Sir
I should really be getting back to mine