Serge Gainsbourg. I’ve talked about him when I previously covered L’Homme à tête de chou (1976.) It’s a great record, don’t get me wrong. But, I’ve had the intention once again to highlight how this man has an incredible talent when creating music. It’s sort of mesmerizing, and intriguing when you hear his monotone vocals synchronized perfectly towards the melody. Of course it can be off putting, but at the same time works well with one another. But that’s not all, I’ve gotta highlight his famous “Gainsbarre” character. This type of persona revolves around the establishment, doing things his own way, and not giving a damn about what the others think. Like burning currency live on national television, or even having a reggae version of France’s national anthem Aux armes et caetera (1979.) By the way, in case you’re wondering, it sounds pretty good, do me a favour and check it out! But what’s remarkable about Serge Gainsbourg was how he did not seclude himself towards an idea, and that’s it. While you’re checking out that tune, you could tell how he was exploring new musical ideas, and genres. He didn’t want to restrict himself towards the classic francophone style, he wanted to explore all the realms that music has to offer. And to that, I’ve gotta tip my hat to him. It gets pretty challenging to break off from something you’re used to doing, and going into something that you’re not too sure of. It’s almost like a “make break it” situation. And the result led to Gainsbourg releasing one of his controversial, yet one of his great records of all time, Histoire de Melody Nelson (1971.) I’m not gonna get into the explanation of the record since it revolves around an off-putting sexual connotation. But I want to say that you can tell during this time that Gainsbourg was in search of some sort of engaging melody. And yeah, you can hear him still around the classic francophone genre, but branching slowly in the rock world. It captures this electric aurora, with pretty deep bass lines that are instant winners to me. Check out Ballade de Melody Nelson  where there’s this deep thumping of a bassline that gets repeated, while Gainsbourg, and former partner in crime Jane Birkin collaborate into this sort of sweet sensation. Or even the presence of a string section in L’hotel Particulier (BOF “Melody Nelson”) that elevates the song into an unexpected level of greatness.