Your favourite foreign language song please. Not just loads of youtube links, tell us why its mycket bra
My current fave is Abre La Puerta (open the door) by Triana . I recently inherited my dads record collection and this took my back to the mid eighties and sitting in our very brown lounge, listening to it with him when I was 7 or 8, and being really impressed that people spoke other languages!
Hard to pick just one from Rammstein, but I'll go with Du Hast. Saw them live before really listening to them, was at the Sonisphere festival. Loved the show, saw them on an arena tour a few years ago which was even better and was due to see them in the Millennium Stadium back in June. Ah well.
Du Hast used to be my mobile ringtone too.
Das Ding - Blöd genug für diese Welt (Stupid Enough for this World)
First heard it when I was on a German school exchange as a kid and loved the lyrics and the fact Punk just kind of works in German. The translation of some of the idiomatic expressions amused me as well - dumm wie Stroh ('stupid as straw') being the equivalent of our 'thick as two short planks'. And the sentiment of it - "I would like, if possible, to be stupid enough for this world", whether that's stupid enough to be oblivious of everything in it or just stupid enough to not worry about it, kind of chimed as I got older...
I've got a Spotify playlist dedicated to foreign language songs, but I'll just select a couple
Sherwood and Pinch - Stand Strong
She's singing about church
LA Cumbia Moderna Soledad -Crees Que Soy Sexy. JD Twitch to thank for this gem
No real reason except that the first time I heard Stereolab on John Peel's show (1991/2?) I knew I would like them forever!
Just because I love Bonnie's voice 🙂
*
Another Stereolab here. ‘Refractions in the Plastic Pulse’
Why? Partly just because it feels like an old friend I’ve been listening to it for so many years. It has the classic Stereolab hypnotic lilt going into a signature motorik groove. Moods and tempos shift, taking us on a journey. A song of four distinct movements - the last being a lighter reprise of the first. Overall it’s almost like a ‘best of Stereolab’ put into one song. That sounds trite but I’m being literal. It’s like a condensed channeling of The Labness, distilling into a pool of perfect liquid pop <- There I’m doing ‘Will Ferrel doing a music journo’ . Like I’m joking but serious too.
Mind-blowing drumming from Andy Ramsay (Possibly the most unsung drummer of all time. His pocket is in a pocket)
Killer harmonies with Mary Hansen. And Sadier never sounded so alluring.
It’s all just perfect if there is such a thing. And I never listen just once, even if it’s over 17mins long. It’s basically an EP!
Ce qui est n'est pas clos, du point de vue le
Plus essentiel,
Ce qui est ouvert, est à être
Dans une action sans fin,
Sans trophée et sans gloire-
Une création sans fond,
Sans profit ni victoire
Difficult choice, having lived abroad for several years it would be easy to choose a German language song with special meaning. However, I think the one foreign group that really had a special place in my music development has to be Molotov. Basically found a CD in the 5 DM -sale bin in the music shop while in Germany and thought it was worth a punt. Loved it, especially this track. No idea why. Just so different to any thing else I had heard up till then.
Typed loads, got ****ing logged out after hitting submit. So just a pop song, sung beautifully
A German love song, I have listened so often that I can sing along.
Sometimes I too would like my life back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0k8xMiZp588
I discovered this from a travel article in The Guardian over lockdown. It appeals to my inner Socialist.
Another one from BBC this time, a Catalan love song
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bS3MBJnxj_Y
I was trying to say earlier that it's interesting how, for a country so close to ours, such a different sounding language has developed.
Love the sound of this, no idea what they're on about but I'm guessing it's not guns hos and bitches
OK, so it's a foreign language because it's a created one, so maybe it doesn't count. But this is the most beautiful thing I've ever heard. It makes me cry, laugh, rage and exult every single time I hear it.
However, I think the one foreign group that really had a special place in my music development has to be Molotov
Love a bit of Molotov, but prefer it a bit harder:
Anyway, favourite non-English/non-Spanish song:
Another Stereolab here. ‘Refractions in the Plastic Pulse’
Thanks for that, just gone and bought the remastered vinyl 🙂
Guru - Le Bien Le Mal (ft MC Solaar)
Dj. Krush feat Rino - Shin-Sekai
I just love a female french accent.
I don’t much listen to foreign language lyrics, I wouldn’t understand them, but I love this most poppy of pop songs. But in all honesty I have the Captain Sensible cover of the English lyrics version in my head when I hear it
Edit: the English lyrics are not a translation of the French BTW
Some French music follows.
Can't find a video of it, but the version of Bouge de la from the Tour de la Question MC Solaar album is epic.
Thanks for that, just gone and bought the remastered vinyl 🙂
Dots and Loops? 🙂 Man alive I’d like to hear that. Didn't know it had been done. I use Tidal for music, and the ‘master’ quality, but just looked and D&L Remastered isn't available on there. Ballache. Looks like getting the CD and taking the FLAC.
Anyway - the original 1997 album is one of the few albums of any artist that I’d be happy to say is ‘perfect’ 👍🏼
Also M.D.K by Magma, which is also non-English. It’s sung entirely in a ‘musical language’ named ‘Kobaïan’, realised by the drummer/founder. It’s incredibonkers. If you like Wagnerianjazzprogchant operas written from the future, that is. https://www.tinymixtapes.com/music-review/magma-mekanik-destruktiw-kommandoh
I don’t much listen to foreign language lyrics, I wouldn’t understand them
Reminds me of that line from Shawshank Redemption (when they play a record of ‘Canzonetta Sull’aria for two sopranos‘ over the prison yard PA system.
“I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don’t want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I’d like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can’t be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free.”
And now of course you just google the lyrics in English. Then listen afresh.
Dots and Loops? 🙂 Man alive I’d like to hear that. Didn’t know it had been done. I use Tidal for music, and the ‘master’ quality, but just looked and D&L Remastered isn’t available on there. Ballache. Looks like getting the CD and taking the FLAC.
Anyway – the original 1997 album is one of the few albums of any artist that I’d be happy to say is ‘perfect’ 👍🏼
Yep, comes with a 3rd disc of demos and outtakes too 🙂
I own a few bits by Stereolab (mostly 12"s but couple of albums) but not this one for some reason.
I love Spanish language so Ojos De Brujo are played a lot.
As is Ive Mendes.
From North Africa sometimes it just has to be Ishtar with Alabina or Gypsy Kings
Laibach for general mad shit
Here's a nice easy intro to their back catalogue
For silliness I love a bit of Julien Doré, this could be his magnum opus
Laibach can **** right off.
I saw them in Germany , they had a back drop of a swastika made out of axes and 2 Hitler youth type drummers up front.
The atmosphere in the venue was truly hideous.
We left after one song.
We are not nazi scumbags but.......
Can I add Tinariwen?
Saw them live at the Big Chill and the sun was shining. Their music made me smile. Made me want to dance and whirl like people used to do in the old days. Then I realised that I was cul-de-sacked closed-off Oldskool 1980s English, and so could only at best mechanically jerk-pump to a repetitive 4/4 beat. Or do the twist like this.
I remember thinking ‘here and now I’m not going to live up to the new feelings that I am feeling’ so just swayed a bit from side-to-side self-consciously gripping my plastic beer cup and furtively glancing around to see if anyone had caught me in the act. Finally remembered that Mrs Rider may want to dance so I clung to her instead of the beer 😂. But I’m thankful to that band for teasing a lot more cloth out of my ears and for making me at least WANT to dance and look further into older forms of music outside of the UK/US post-WW2 bubble. Since discovering traditional/folk music all over. A real gut-punch/new journey.
STW bonus: Looking into the lyrics it seems it’s a song about a ‘Louise‘.
Lulla
I went to see Lulla, who's wearing nylon;
I went to see Bajou, the situation is hard.
I went to see Soro, and then came back from Soro's;
I went to see Mizgawa, sheìs seated and elegant.
I went to see Lulla, who's wearing nylon;
I went to see Bajou, the situation is hard.
I went to see El-Xafra, where the pious
do their ablutions ...1
I went to see Lulla, who's wearing nylon;
I went to see Bajou, the situation is hard.
I went to see Tina, she says "there's no more".
I went to see Tina, she says "there's no more".
I went to see Lulla, who's wearing nylon;
I went to see Bajou, the situation is hard.
I went to see Abnousou, it was raining;
I went to see Rati, a girl with a temper!
I went to see Lulla, who's wearing nylon;
I went to see Bajou, the situation is hard.
https://lyricstranslate.com/en/lulla-lulla.html
Okay so had this album, french exchange related. Posting shortest track. Still sounds okay. The photo of the band has their clothes just on the vinyl outside cover. Slide out the cardboard sleeve and they're naked...
Manu Chau I just really like. Big in central America, surfer friends brought back burnt CDs, many van trips...
If I was maradona, I'd live just like him... Superb.
Air, early 90s Hackney and multiple french campsites
Ou sont les heroes, mal raze, bien habile?
(Phone on English).
Daft Punk. Not much language, lots of French...
(A related thread would be English language bands chucking in a verse or two of French - Beatles' Michelle, blondie Denise Denise damn autocorrect, lady gaga bad romance,etc etc)
Singer was connard but a great track:
@zippykona - they use right wing and left wing iconography/symbols (usually at the same time) and are generally as mad as a box of frogs. It's like some giant art school project to antagonise everyone.
The music is a bit shit too. If you take it at face value, faux-industrial neo-metal it's mildly entertaining.
Clannad - Theme from Harry's Game.
This thread is in serious danger of entering Jazz Club level of ****ery.
Anyway, Kvelertak - Bråtebrann. Summed up by this comment on YouTube "I'm Norwegian and I still can't understand the lyrics" (They're Norwegian).
The correct answer is Rammstein - Sonne
I don’t much listen to foreign language lyrics, I wouldn’t understand them
Who needs to understand the words, the music should convey the emotion; in the words of Aldous Huxley, “Apart from silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible, is music”*. It doesn’t even have to have words, for that matter!
I’ve got albums sung in Welsh, French, Mongolian, Russian, Japanese, Scottish and Irish Gaelic, and Cornish, it matters not that I can understand the words, I can understand the emotion behind them.
*Sometime soon that will be tattooed on my arm.