Sunday, July 24, 2011

Jane Birkin and Serge Gainsbourg Are Gross



Since I moved to New York especially, it seems 60's French pop is inescapable. Sometimes I think if I hear that song "Bonnie and Clyde" with Jane Birkin or whoever* it is singing in that French accent I'm gonna kill someone. It seems like everyone can conveniently play this shit because it is retro and French and seems vaguely stylish and won't offend. I am also tired of seeing photos of lank, blank-faced Jane Birkin and disturbingly frog-like Serge Gainsbourg all over fashion inspiration posts like he is not old enough to be her inbred father.

It's as though we've forgotten these canonical relationships of past eras were informed by the extreme sexism of their day, especially the 1960's era musicians and "their women."

Seriously, these look like people you'd see getting into a violent altercation in a dollar store.


Ugh! What is this nasty chauvinistic shit? May I remind you he sang a song called "Lemon Incest" with his teenage daughter? Aside from the fact that people still seem convinced the French are superior fashion-wise to Americans even though I see French people everyday who look just as shittily dressed as those of us in the US, with the advent of fast-paced modern technology it matters less and less what the story of the images we are posting as inspiration on our blogs are.

I recently read Faithfull by Marianne Faithfull, and for much of the book, she talks about being depressed, drug-addicted, anorexic, angry regarding how she was used and only valued for her beauty, all the while this fiction of her as a person and especially Mick Jagger's girlfriend was being created. But these aspects don't show up in our inspiration posts.

It's not like we can't post photos of Marianne to inspire us, but if we have the internet to repost photos we know nothing about, we also have it as tool to find out about these people and not gloss over the fact that Serge Gainsbourg is gross, you know?

*I guess it was Bridget Bardot. Whatevs.

26 comments:

Marie-Christine said...

Well, HE is the one who's particularly gross. Not just old enough to be her father, but already deathly alcoholic, and one of the worst pigs on the planet. OK, maybe Vadim was as bad :-). But still, even Vadim didn't make his 13-year-old sing about incest with him. Note how that's the same age as the girl Polansky raped, not such a coincidence I'm sure in terms him being welcomed in France with open arms (such a genius! those Americans are such puritans).

Although Brigitte Bardot is way up there in grossness in my book. I've really been puking about how Burda's been playing her up as such an icon of style. Seeing how she's a card-carrying fascist (not a figure of speech, living with no2 in the Front National) and sporting multiple convictions for racist hate speech (just about every year since that law passed). I tried writing to them about it, but I think I ought to start a net petition...

Bonitta said...

just a comment to sum up: ARGH

Anonymous said...

Eh, you just don't get it.

Anonymous said...

Serge Gainsbourg > you

Simone said...

OH MY GOD that anonymous commenter is totally right! Serge Gainsbourg, with his bloated toad face, is WAY better than you! You really should just kill yourself right now, because you suck.

You know what's really hip? Stylized partner violence against women. GOD THATS SO COOL.

Linda said...

He is gross, and the photos too.

Anonymous said...

Picture is a matter of individual taste.
but it doesn't take away the fact that he was a brilliant artist, composer

Galad

Mary said...

Yes, I guess it is personal taste that it is gross HE is dating model young enough to be his daughter and also singing songs about incest with his actual daughter and taking sexxy domestic-violence themed photos. While his talent? Simply fact.

As talent wise, he is whatevs. I certainly don't think his music would be popular today if he didn't have a persona that is currently en vogue, what with the popularity of French people from the 60's and fashion blogs about French people from the 60's.

Anonymous said...

Please, please read and learn guys : lolita, madame bovary, crime and punishement... Personnally I think the pictures are beautiful and that you should not confuse art with reality...

Regarding "Lemon Incest": most of the most beautiful novels/plays deal with Incest and society taboos, not with the american stupid love fairy tale we see in every new Hollywood release...

Cheers,

B.

Mary said...

The conceit of the artist and the self-important view of the art world is that art stands alone as some kind of special truth and isn't merely another victim/representation of a trend or societal institution.

If these images and the edgy French films, etc. you speak of really did deal with taboos, they would illuminate a perspective other than the dominant one.

These images don't deal honestly with violence, they glamorize it and sexualize it though a typical high fashion vibe. THEY are a cliche, as corny and trite as any Hollywood romcom. Particularly with that nasty 80's faux-marbalized background!

Anonymous said...

This was a very interesting post for me to read. I have just got back from Paris (I live in London and am in New York one a year and have to say - they do dress better and look better than both our nations - fact; maybe you were in the wrong part - pigalle?) where Serge is idolised and the repeatitive adulation is he is a poet and a master of words that unless you dont speak french you wont know why or how. Irrespective everything you say about him and these images is true and how we idolise people for their looks over their minds or actual situition!

Anonymous said...

omg how superficial you are! I feel sorry for you!truly!!!!

Mary said...

jesus christ what is with the serge gainsbourg worship. the music is dated, people. dated.

Anonymous said...

fuck you

Jane said...

Perhaps 'gross' is a little simplistic. As an American who lived in Paris in the 70’s and listened to lots of French music, I can see the appeal of his lyrics and iconoclastic persona. BUT the biopic about him subtitled 'A Heroic Life' seems poorly named as all his relationships with his fellow humans reveal him to be manipulative and entirely lacking in empathy. In many ways he fits the description of a sociopath. Even with a great talent, add a lot of alcohol and it's a pretty nasty cocktail.

jason said...

As you finally figured out, it was Bardot who sang on "Bonnie and Clyde." I love the way she said "Bonnieee" and it was Birkin who sang the duet on "Je't'aime."

Gainsbourg once said that he preferred ugliness to beauty because "ugly endures." So he would have been happy to hear your description...but he was an artist, a bohemian and probably wouldn't be over concerned about anyone's opinion of him. To say that he could be crass, rude and controversial is nothing new.

Mary said...

He may have conveniently preferred ugliness for himself, but he certainly didn't prefer it for the women he surrounded himself with.

Anonymous said...

well, dah'ling, t'est une grosse salope yourself, what can I say...

Mary said...

It's funny how this post seemed to work so many people up. It seems like common sense that Serge Gainsbourg was gross; these photos alone show it so well.

Even if you like his music, canonizing him as some kind of chic, untouchable god is disturbing. But keep in mind that how typical, trendy and reactionary this stance is: defending him doesn't mean you are some tres chic arbitrator of taste, it means you are just like everyone else!

inès said...

"Whatever you might say about Serge Gainsbourg, it has probably been said before and probably by Gainsbourg himself. "
Maybe this means YOU are just like everyone else too then :)
(and just like Serge Gainsbourg himself, lucky you !!)

Mary said...

Somehow I doubt Serge Gainsbourg had a lot to say about misogyny and his promotion of rape culture, as well as his modern place in the trendosphere circa 2012...but let me know if you find any quotes!

nils said...

Stop being so american.

They're on blogs because the image of a guy who doesn't give a fuck and a girl who loves it is still the dream (for most of us, not just americans).

Have more fun. Smoke and have sex.
And if you're lucky enough to pull a girl as hot as he did when you're fat, ugly and old you'll have done well.

Mary said...

But what exactly is "fun" for ME about embracing having sex with ugly old men? I must be really missing out on this sexy, hedonistic French lifestyle.

Maybe the next time I get leered at by some flabby bald creep I should be like, "Care for a gauloise, monsieur? Perhaps we should go back to my flat for some wine and an erotic exploration of John Paul Sartre."

There's nothing unique about an old man/young lady relationship, though. We have that in America too, and in fits in with the idea of a patriarchal society.

Mary said...

Also, the idea that French culture is inherently more stylish, sophisticated, more free, etc. than Americans, in this day and age, is laughable.

PDXPOP said...

Regarding Sex & role playing, I believe the French are far more open & sophisticated than the fairly puritanical mirage the good ole U.S of A when it comes to this sort of thing. While I do not like girls that look too young it is only fair to point out that you are considered an adult when you are 16 in most European countries you can drink wine @ 12 Marry at 14 in some places. Now France raised its age for women from 15 to 18 to stop forced marriage, but in Gainsboug's time 14 15 was considered by the society acceptable. EWWW but that's the facts. Any way he hated his looks yet managed to be with some of the worlds most beautiful women & make some of the best pop the world has seen & the 1978 Dub album was a breakthrough in itself. as for what women like in bed who but the women involved are to say what the can enjoy. If its feathers or riding crop its not cruel if that's what float's their boat. But it is true Serge was not a looker in fact he compared himself to those horrible Nazi Anti Jew propaganda posters the Krauts had up in Paris when he was a kid.

Anonymous said...

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