Chebran - French Boogie Volume 2 - LP

The French in the 80s were not faint-hearted: as some threw themselves heart and soul into music or business, others wouldn’t mind going bottomless to get themselves noticed… While Bernard Tapie soon realized his own fortune was rather to be found in business, many music-loving dreamers already imagined themselves in the sun, in an enchanting world made of funky rhythms and synthesizers.

While the French National Front was growing in the shadow of François Mitterrand, these guys mixed New York-style funk with electronic, Eastern or African sounds. These musicians from all backgrounds – often lovers of “gentle pranking” as introduced by the newly-licensed independent radio stations – were seeking the easy money they were told about so much. With their genre-crossing arrangements and often chanted lyrics, they brought honor to the “SOS Racisme” generation, unconsciously outlining the nascent French contemporary urban culture.

It must be said, the time was conducive to all kinds of mixes: following the left’s accession to power, many illegal immigrants had just been sorted out, and Southern cultures were in vogue in all fields. The French, while admiring Grace Jones’ “savage beauty” in Jean-Paul Goude’s advertisements, were enjoying their freshly-gained fifth week of paid vacation, tanning on the beaches of Maghreb. Following The Clash’s example, punks and rockers converted to reggae, and the new independent radios opened up their programming to “world music”. Even politicians – of all persuasions – frequented the select Parisian nightclub Keur Samba to discreetly scheme with the future of “Françafrique” to the sound of disco and exotic hits…

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