France224 - A touch of French music in 224 chansons

Allons enfants, let's throw Coldplay out de la Patrie

La prise de la Bastille survenue le 14 juillet 1789 à Paris est l'un des événements inauguraux et emblématiques de la Révolution française*. So emblématique, that July 14 is the French National Day.

Here's my little sonic tribute to the land of liberté, egalité & fraternité: a playlist made with 224 "french songs" (one for each year since the hot Bastille days). It's not a chart and it's not based on any chart. All choises are quite personal: I picked some of my favourite songs.

It doesn't respect strong rules, either. "French songs" means these tracks are basically composed/played/sung by a french artist/band. But don't expect 100% french purity: there are many covers, many English (or Spanish) language songs, many artists that somehow are just partially French but keep a very strong link to French history (or, anyway, my idea of French art, culture and history): Manu Chao, Django Rheinardt, Santa Esmeralda, Carla Bruni, Josephine Baker.

Some things you may find in it:
- old piano and classical things (Claude Debussy, Erik Satie,  Hector Berlioz)
- young piano and movie things (Yann Tiersen)
- a bit of piano jazz (Michel Petrucciani)
- old dance things (Cerrone, Patrick Hernandez, Santa Esmeralda)
- young dance things (Bob Sinclar, Cassius, Modjo)
- old female voices (Edith Piaf, Françoise Hardy, Brigitte Bardot)
- young female voices (Camille, Coralie Clement, Françoiz Breut)
- old male voices (Charles Aznavour, Charles Trenet, George Brassens)
- young male voices (Cali, Benjamin Biolay, Benabar)
- plenty of stuff by my favourite ones (Air, Daft Punk, Mickey 3D, Autour de Lucie, Phoenix, lovely Zaz)
- some guilty little pop pleasure (Guesch Patti, Alizée, Vanessa Paradis)
- some bands from the late 20th century (Noir Desir, Tahiti 80, Louise Attaque)
- some world patchankas (Mano Negra, Les Negresses Vertes, Zebda)
- some new sounds (M83, The Liminanas, Yelle)
- Gainsbourg father & daughter
- some bizarre things like a celtic harp, a former tennis player, an electro-tango combo

And much more.

Again, that's a really personal one: the French world of Spotirama. Hope you enjoy it.

W la France.

* The famous painting above, La Liberté guidant le peuple by Eugène Delacroix, doesn't commemorate the 1789 revolution, but the July revolution of 1830. For those who don't get the Coldplay reference, look at the cover of this album. :-) 

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