Ca plane pour moi...

French language music has never made it in the UK. Can you think of any? Sacha Distel's "Thank Heavens for Little Girls" was a translation and is probably best not spoken about in polite circles. Apart from that, I can think of three others:

1. Serge Gainsbourg's and Jane Birkin's "Je t'aime, moi non plus",
   
2. Vanessa Paradis' "Joe le Taxi", and,
3. Plastic Bertrand's "Ca Plane pour Moi". This song was really popular at the end of the 70's, surfing on the back-end of the punk wave. Unfortunately, I was pre-pubescent at the time, so by the time my face was covered in spots, it was New Romantic rather than New Wave (although, Wham were seriously under-rated :-) ). However, Plastic's song stuck in the mind of lots of people (at least I think so: maybe I'm the only one who's heard of it?).

It was the "Village Fête" this weekend and imagine my surprise when I saw that Plastic was doing a show in a marquee on the local football pitch! It seems he is doing the rounds with a couple of other singers from the same era. As it's a village (well, OK, a small town), the football pitches are only a few hundred metres from our house and we could hear the music from the garden. It was a lovely afternoon, and we had just finished the annual "City Mountain Biking" tour - up and down the hills of Lyon with the traffic stopped for the cyclists - an excellent day out (but if you've ever been to Lyon you'll know that there are some killer hills).

So a bunch of us are sat in the garden with a beer, and guess what comes on? Oh yes, you've guessed it, Plastic was knocking out his old standard. It was more cabaret than punk, but he got a standing ovation from us at the end. Thanks Plastic, you made my day.
I'm sure he was playing huge venues in the early 80's, and a village fête is not be in the same bracket, but hey, 30 years later and he's still out there, doing what he loves. Not many people can say that about their lives.

Unless of course, he is absolutely sick of being remembered for one song, a stupid name, playing "provincial tent gigs" and is doing it because it because he is broke. Damn, that spoiled my upbeat ending!