Gourmandises: Mylène Farmer and the Truth of the Song

[Rev]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

This is a controversial subject and I'd like to make a "suggestion" that we hold off discussing it until the day after Christmas. Even if you don't believe in this holiday, it's a time of year that many people enjoy, including Alizée, so for these few days, let's have no controversy and no fighting. The day after, the store's open for business.

You mean on Boxing Day.

[Ray4AJ]

I've got some free time this morning, so here I am. Bon natale Alizée !

Personally I love the song because Alizée sings it. I love every song she sings. It's easy to believe the childlike innocence myth that Mylene created around Alizée but 15 years later we've learned more about Alizée and can see through that. She said in an interview waaay back that her songs had a side for the 'little ones' and one for adults. Her parents knew it, she's a smart girl, she knew it too. She also said eventually that the genre of music she was making was not the kind she listened to, so I think she left after the 2003-4 tour to move away from that. She never returned to anything even slightly 'popish' until it was too late.

[Jazzmin]

For all I know, Mylène and Laurent encouraged Alizée to read "Lolita" so that the latter would know what the song was about. If Mylène made no bones about it, then I see no reason why she should intentionally keep Alizée in the dark of the "adult" meaning behind her lyrics, nor can I even begin to imagine Alizée being blind to the sexual allure her entire stage persona was imbued with. But well, no actual interviews that could shed light on the issue come into my mind . I mean, interviews that mention the manyfold meanings of her Gourmandises/MCE lyrics (besides the fact that Alizée would describe to Mylène her personality, things she's fond of etc. and Mylène would write lyrics based on that material). However, it doesn't necessarily mean she didn't know; maybe analysing lyrics wasn't something fun to do, maybe she just didn't find it important, maybe it was Mylène who aimed to create that "childlike innocence myth" (that IMHO wasn't really plausible, it was not 1966). I can only vaguely remember an interview from the 5 era in which Lilly said she preferred easily understandable lyrics to double entendres. (I'll try to retrieve it if I have the time to do it.) I'd be also really keen to read the interview Ray4AJ is talking about, unless it's the same one.

[Ray4AJ]

Originally Posted by Jazzmin

I'd be also really keen to read the interview Ray4AJ is talking about, unless it's the same one.

Originally Posted by Ray4AJ

She said in an interview waaay back that her songs had a side for the 'little ones' and one for adults.

She also said eventually that the genre of music she was making was not the kind she listened to.

Well Jazzmin, it took me an hour to find this. I think there was an older one that mentioned the 'little ones' but it's mentioned here in this Psyche era interview, among other things. The last Q&A that I quoted below seems to show that she likes that MCE had fewer of the double meanings than Gourmandises.

http://alizeeamerica.com/forums/show...93&postcount=4

Originally Posted by garçoncanadien

Personally, do you think that you were caged in, that you were artistically frustrated, that you didn't have your word to say...

No it wasn't the case! I told myself instead: "What you are doing musically, is it that if it were not you singing it, you would listen to it on your iPod?" That was the real question!

During your 2003-2004 tour you were confronted by the public. People thought that you were a singer for adolescents and there they discovered that you have a real gay fan base?

Its true that I really didn't know what kind of audience that I was going to have! It has been four years snce I have sung and those were my first shows. With singers of my age who each have their own audience, the question that was asked was: "What is Alizee's audience"? This was very eclectic, but I went along with it very well. My songs have double meanings so kids have taken it to the first degree and others have interpreted it in another fashion. I am very proud of having a large audience and to include gays. They are in fact more loyal than the others!

Exactly, while on the subject of delicacies, it is said that candy have a sensual, even sexual connotation. Do they have a double meaning?

(Big laughs). (Editors note: Alizee makes a mischievous grin to answer this fundamental question). My two previous albums exactly revolved around the double meaning with the sexual connotations. The last one was quite a bit less and the better for it! At the same time its Jean Fauque who writes so its not the same pen as Mylene.

I still think there was an early interview where she acknowledged the double meanings in her albums, but I'm not going to search for it right now.

EDIT_

Okay, I did find the earlier reference I was thinking about. See these screenshots from Alizee - 2003-06-03 - Interview - Une Heure Avec Alizee.

Interviewer Question


Alizée

[zingy]

Below is an example of one of Mylene Farmer's songs with weird double meanings.

[Scruffydog777]

Originally Posted by zingy

Below is an example of one of Mylene Farmer's songs with weird double meanings.

I watched this video and I have a "feeling" that it's typical of a lot of her songs, that many people feel have a sexual meaning to them, but I think in a court of law, you'd have a tough time proving your case, but I'm guessing in some of her other songs, it would be a quick guilty as charged.

I've written before that it was said, she designed her own sex toy, then wrote a song about it (Sextonik). She even sold vibrators at one of her concerts.There's no doubt she uses sex to sell.

Now garconcanadien who was mentioned earlier if memory serves me correctly obviously was from Canada and I believe he was a medical student and I believe he was fluent in French though I'm far from certain on that. He at the time, made a post that had "interpretations" of many of Alizee's early songs made by Anthony. I don't remember much about Anthony so I don't know how qualified he was to do interpretations, but I think if garcon.... was posting his interpretations, they may have been credible.

Now in this post that had several interpretations, the song J'en ai marre was listed, but it was mentioned that this was R rated and it was not by Anthony. It didn't say if it was garcon's interpretation or someone else's.

It's a very controversial interpretation. I wont even post a link to it because even with my limited French, I feel that it could be way off base. I think members if they so choose should look for it and realize it is the view of some people, but I think this "forum" does not want it reposted.

I've seen different interpretations of this song and all I'm going to say at this point is I'm fairly certain there was no gold fish in the tub with her.

Now depending upon what version of Alizée 101 you've read, Alizée knew of the general sexual meaning of some of these song, but it's been said Jeremy came along and explained to her the deeper meanings of a song such as this interpretation of jam and this was "one" thing that led to her decision to leave MF. I have no idea if that's true, but it would kind of explain what seemed to be a sudden decision to leave MF when it was rumored Amelie would be the next single.

As I mentioned in another thread, I've spoken in person with RMJ when I met him a couple times in Europe. I have issues with him but he is very knowledgeable about Alizée. He was of the opinion that she was upset with MF and one of the reasons for the long absence after the concerts, was that she was actually under contract to do 3 albums with MF and the only way to get out of it was to wait so many years.

Moi Lolita is another controversial song and not so much for the original story which Alizée and her family knew was of a sexual nature, but for some of the lyrics which seemed to have been cleansed by so many translations of the lyrics into English and I'd like to bring attention to the lines...
Et quand je donne ma longue aux chats
A line which I've read can have a very innocent meaning, but remember this was MF writing the lyrics and the controversy was in what you interpreted "chats" to mean.
Quand je reve aux loups, c'est Lola qui saigne.
That's something that I think is relatively easy to interpret, but it seems so many sites that offer you English lyrics of the song, get it wrong.

There was also a member in here who was from Montreal. He was fluent in French. It seemed his main goal in here is he wanted to discuss the sexual meaning he thought was present in just about all her songs. We talked many times via pm. I discussed in the moderators forum that he wanted to be able to discuss this in the forum, but it was the view of the mods, that we had a lot of younger members and for that reason it was decided not to have a thread about that topic. It was discussed also if maybe there might be a way for members to discuss this in a private way, but that didn't seem doable, so it was dropped.

Now I'm assuming this is still a policy of this forum. We have to be careful what we discuss. I encourage members, at least adult members to do research, to know what's out there, but I'm sure "we" will still limit what is said in here, especially where so much of this is subject to interpretation.

[zingy]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

she designed her own sex toy, then wrote a song about it (Sextonik). She even sold vibrators at one of her concerts.

The Sextonik was sold in a coffin. Perhaps the meaning of this is that although the French are obsessed with sex, they do not produce children. So what is in the box cannot bring reproduction. Use would be the end of the line of ancestry. It would be an analogy of the French people that are going extinct.

[Scruffydog777]

Those are some interesting thoughts. I'm certainly no expert on MF. I've listened to many of her songs in the hope they might do for me what her Alizée songs did for me, but that never happened. I've read different stories on her here and there, but there is a hell of a lot more I don't know, than I do know, but one thing I'm sure of is she used sex to sell.

I'm also sure there might be a lot more double meanings in songs from Alizee's first two albums. I'm aware of the more obvious ones, but I don't really want to look into the ones that may have been better hidden. I'm very happy with the way I think Alizée interpreted them. That's just my opinion but if others in here want to keep discussing them, as long as it falls within the guide lines of the forum, go right ahead.

[Rev]

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

...Now depending upon what version of Alizée 101 you've read, Alizée knew of the general sexual meaning of some of these song, but it's been said Jeremy came along and explained to her the deeper meanings of a song such as this interpretation of jam and this was "one" thing that led to her decision to leave MF. I have no idea if that's true, but it would kind of explain what seemed to be a sudden decision to leave MF when it was rumored Amelie would be the next single....

We don't know what pushed her over the edge with regards to leaving Mylene, however, she has stated that she did not know "all" the double meanings at the time, and that Jeremy did give her a more complete perspective.

Originally Posted by Scruffydog777

...As I mentioned in another thread, I've spoken in person with RMJ when I met him a couple times in Europe. I have issues with him but he is very knowledgeable about Alizée. He was of the opinion that she was upset with MF and one of the reasons for the long absence after the concerts, was that she was actually under contract to do 3 albums with MF and the only way to get out of it was to wait so many years..

This is my understanding as well that she may have had to wait for this reason. However, I believe it was the record company, not Mylene, who's contract required the wait.

[Scruffydog777]

Hey Rev,
I "think" you made a small typo. In your first statement you said "she stated that she did now know.......". I think you meant "did not know". Is that the case?

Going back to Alizée 101. Mylene sold the right back to her of using her own name for a ceremonial $1. I can't remember in what year that was. Was that also the time that what ever contract she was under expired?