JOY Eurovision

21 Mar 2012

Musings – Meaning

Musings, Uncategorized

I’m a wax doll, a sawdust doll

My heart is engraved in my songs

Wax doll, sawdust doll

Am I better, am I worse than a fashion doll?

I see life through bright rosy-tinted glasses

Wax doll, sawdust doll

“Poupée de cire, poupée de son” is one of the most intellectually interesting songs ever presented at Eurovision.

It is jam-packed with wordplay and the games it plays are not all they seem.

It sounds sweet, but it bites.

It looks fresh & hopeful, but a darker place lurks nearby.

Encasing “Poupée de cire, poupée de son” in the packaging of the age – “le swinging 60s” – makes the whole thing even more challenging & more than a little disturbing.

Its composer Serge Gainsbourg when asked about it said: “the songs young people turn to for help in their first attempts at discovering what life and love are about, are sung by people too young and inexperienced to be of much help and condemned by their celebrity to find out.”

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose has never rung truer !

The 17-year old France Gall was the perfect vessel as she sang her way to victory for Luxembourg.

So sweet looking, so winning in her performance.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5aeeSmkPwQ&feature=related]

It’s as if France Gall had been seduced into the world of “Poupée de cire, poupée de son”, & now she’s seducing us in the audience.

When she got a little older and wiser she turned against Gainsbourg in general and this song in particular.

“Poupée de cire, poupée de son” is a song that you are never quite sure of and the more you think about it the less clear it becomes.

It is as far away from a “moon-June” kind of song that you can get.

It is quite a conumdrum.

Whatever else it is, “Poupée de cire, poupée de son” is a hand grenade hurled into the crowded market place of popular culture.

And its collateral damage is still being observed, often far beyond the francophone world.

How the heck did it make it to Israel ?

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2txbX8YfWIA]

As for other recent versions, it seems to be a rite of passage for some.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLdNX7HQI5Y]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=752bW5cjXzw]

And then there’s a Poupée phenomenon in Japan.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndjS-nVVNM4]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzZfaiiCOBY]

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qn4PCrqxB2A]

And “Poupée de cire, poupée de son” is such a robust song it can survive the assault of rockabilly !

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tVhNx1s-VTE&feature=fvst]

And back to Europe the Gainsbourg song lives on in the hard arsed world of the talent quest.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yM6bDktHraY&feature=related]

Irony has never been Eurovision’s strongest suit, but through a winning song early in its history it sent something out into the wider world that never fails to bewitch, beguile and disturb.