Music in France

I love music and concerts, and I was particularly happy to get this opportunity to live in France because other countries often get a lot of really great music that the US doesn't often get exposed to. It's partly why I was so happy that Psy's Gangum Style blew up so much, since a foreign song normally never gets played on US radio. Meanwhile US songs get played all the time in every country, even if English isn't the main language of that country (which is why I find it both depressing and hilarious that people are concerned about making English the official language of the US. Anyone who has ever been overseas understands how ridiculous this concern is)

Proof of this was the Gogol Bordello concert I went to on Tuesday.  It's an American "gypsy punk" band that I've liked ever since seeing them at ACL a few years back and I had them tied with Matt & Kim as my favorite act that year. They were touring with Man Man, and I was incredibly surprised at how crazy and into the music the Parisians were. Typically they're very reserved and introverted people from our experiences so far, but I'd never seen such an incredibly energetic crowd at any concert ever. It may have been because it was Gogol Bordello (which put on incredibly energetic fun concerts) but quite literally the entire place was jumping up and down, crowd surfing, moshing, and dancing their butts off. It was amazing!


But as far as French radio, even with my 10 minutes of drive time in the car everyday, some songs are played incredibly often, and they are quite catchy. And almost none of them are known in the US, so this post is dedicated to my new favorite songs:

Stromae is my favorite new artist. He's from Belgium and has several number 1 hits, including one about "just dancing" that Kayne West sampled for a US hit:


But this is probably my favorite one (about missing his father, the refrain is "Father where are you?"):


And this is his most popular song in Europe (about his girlfriend breaking up with him, the refrain is "Wonderful"):


From other artists, this is one of my favorite French pop songs (It's about how the guy isn't worthy (a "loser" which you can hear in English) to be with the girl):


And this is a UK rapper that has reached #1 in multiple European countries, but won't have any presence at all in the US until May 2014. So I guess around then, expect to hear this on the radio constantly:


Finally this is an older Mika song that hit #1 in France a few years back that was played in Kara's class. It's about all the advice he gets from different women in his life ("She tells me"):


I'm looking forward to exploring more European/French music and going to a lot more concerts!