Track Listing

1. Melody
2. Ballade De Melody Nelson
3. Valse De Melody
4. Ah Melody
5. L'Hotel Particulier
6. En Melody
7. Cargo Culte

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7456 in Music
• Released on: 2001-02-05
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Dimensions: .22 pounds

Amazon.co.uk Review
This, Gainsbourg's first conceptually realised album, is one of his finest moments. The seven tracks here, recorded in 1971, detail his infatuation, lust, blossoming love for and loss of a (very) young girl named Melody Nelson. In "Melody" he knocks a girl off her bike in his Silver Ghost Rolls Royce and, intoxicated by this red-headed English teenager carrying a rag doll, begins a relationship with her. Set to a fragile breakbeat and bowed guitar, the music is majestic, preening. A guitar shimmers dangerously close to a violent outbreak of feedback before settling back into its reverberating motif; strings erupt and soar like a bird of prey. "Ballad Of Melody Nelson", the single off the album, is lilting and light-spirited, buoyed by chiming string arrangements and crystalline acoustic guitar. With its waltz speed and structure, "'Valse De Melody" evokes carefree summer days and the giddy excitability of a fresh romance. "L'Hotel Particulier" narrates the memory of a secret liaison, ending with reconciliation in a Rococo-themed bedroom. It gives way to "En Melody", a brash funk instrumental overpowered by whinnies and snorts let out by Jane Birkin in the midst of sexual horse-play. Like a dream, the album closes with "Cargo Culte"; like a demon brother it adds an atmosphere of doom and gloom to the airy infatuation of the opening track. On returning to her native England, Melody's plane has crashed. In Gainsbourg's imagination, she has become a living sacrifice to a mechanical cargo cult. All that is left are the tortured and twisted bodily remains of his love. Consequently, the guitar melodies have become deliberately detuned, and a 70-piece gothic choir lends a funereal aspect to this requiem for the doomed romantic. --Chris Campion

CD Description
Brimming with lust, drama, and dark humor, HISTORIE DE MELODY NELSON is widely acknowledged as Gainsbourg's masterpiece. The 1971 release was criminally ignored outside France-despite the godfather of French pop's decade of cutting-edge songwriting. It's now something of a cult classic, and artistsas diverse as Air, Nick Cave, and Portishead have all citedthe album as an influence.
Don't be put off by the "concept album" tag. There are no goblins here. Instead, Gainsbourg concentrates on his favourite subjects-sex and death. Thestory line concerns a chance meeting between a middle-aged man and a teenage girl that develops into a passionate affair. Never one to shy away from controversy, Gainsbourg plays his character with consummate sleaze. Remember, this man wrote the playfully obscene "Les Sucettes" for young, innocent France Gall (who thought she was singing about lollypops). Most of the lyrics are intoned in Serge's seedy seductive whisper, intertwined perfectly with the cinematic music. From the slow, smoky funk of "Melody" through intricately arrangedballads and the final apocalyptic "Cargo Culte" (featuring a 70-strong choir), there's never a dull moment. In lesser hands, this would be an overblown mess. MELODY NELSON, in itssubtlety and invention, remains a testament to Gainsbourg'sgenius.

Customer Reviews

Je T'aime, Gainsbourg.
I don't speak or understand the French language, I stopped drinking alcohol 20 years ago and don't smoke BUT Serge Gainsbourg (almost as famous for his boozing and smoking as his music) is one of my great heroes. I love his music so much I got a tattoo of his face on my arm ...and for me Histoire de Melody Nelson is his finest 28 minutes. It's mystical, sexy, seductive, dirty and even a bit vulgar. A concept album about doomed love for an English teenage girl, played by his greatest muse and partner Jane Birkin on the record and the glorious record cover. Birkin stands teasing in just blue jeans clutching a cuddly monkey to her breast. Jane told me in an interview that she placed this monkey in Gainsbourg's coffin with him when he died. The beautiful iconic cover would be worth the price of admission alone but the music is even more mesmerising. During the 60s, and still in in 1971, when this album was originally released, most people were content to make variations on a theme created by The Beatles, Bob Dylan and Brian Wilson... but what Serge offered had a completely unique and individual voice. The gophic bookend tracks of the album Melody and Cargo Culte sound extraordinarily modern even today. There is great tenderness and melancholy in Ballade de Melody Nelson and Ah! Melody. Witness the sound of Jane Birkin laughing hysterically over the grooviest of 70s psych-grooves on En Melody. Birkin was actually being tickled by her brother Andrew Birkin while Serge had a tape running on record under her bed. Don't be put off by the short running time, length doesn't matter, it's what you do with it that counts.
Histoire de Melody Nelson is ultra cool, ultra sexy and ultra modern music.
Je T'aime, Gainsbourg.

It really is that good
What you get here for your money is a guitar/bass/drums power trio playing groove based backings that veer towards the looser side of music, luscious strings that have never accompanied such a band in such a perfect way before or since, and a pervy frenchman trying it on with a young english lass.

This album is great. It's great in the way that Can and Faust are great. It's great in the way Miles Davis is great. Buy it.

Musical Genius
It is little wonder that so many musicians - from many different countries - cite the late, great Serge Gainsbourg as a major influence. Aside from the attitude, the scandals, and all the drinking and women associated with any self-respecting musical star, his music and lyrics were so original, so out-of this-world, that one cannot fail to to see the genius therein. And 'Histoire De Melody Nelson' is, to my mind, his masterpiece. The sensuous vocal and words and the varying music come together to tell a story of doomed love with a young girl. So many different themes and ideas come together before the finale that it is hard to believe that so much has been packed into 28 minutes. When Gainsbourg died, the British Press remembered him more for his drinking and his naughty behaviour - but this album reminds us of just what a musical genius he was, and why he is such an icon in his home country.