Hell's Belles

Vintage sounds, dusty grooves, and 21st-century freaks.

Palladium by Liz Brady is the embodiment of so many brilliant musical anomalies: French 60s girlpop (yé yé, if you want to put a genre name to it), covers (done in a language other than English: bonus!), and frat rock.  It’s got riffs, fuzz, and Liz’s rapid-fire vocals over a wail of teenybopper crowd hysteria.  How can anyone not adore this?

Liz is often mistakenly credited as a French-Canadian yé yé girl, presumably due to her later success with RCA act Les Scarabées. Her career actually began in France, where despite a string of fantastic EPs and extensive gigs, promotional and TV appearances in France, Belgium and Switzerland, she never really quite took off.  Her record label, Pathé, certainly tried every marketing trick in the book to make her a commercial success (a book that the majors still seem to be following today, meow).  In order to fit her into the French yé yé scene her record label decided that her ancestry was a bit too confusing for  the French audiences and opted to cash in on London Carnaby Street cool instead. Apparently being born in Egypt to a French father and Italian/Greek mother and raised in the then-British colonial outpost Kenya wasn’t quite interesting enough.  Since Liz spoke French with a British accent (acquired from her teenage upbringing in Kenya) her label changed her name from Raymonde Fleurat, fabricated a British background and shaved 6 years off her age (24) for good measure.

Ever the indie girl, Liz chose to cover an obscure track by an obscure Texan garage rock band for her 3rd French EP – Palladium, a reworking of The Hip by Tuesday’s Hells Belles stars, The Sparkles. Palladium was originally released in France in Feb 1966, and is comped on the Swinging Mademoiselles series (both bootleg and legit versions) and on the now OOP Ultra Chicks Series.

Liz often rewrote the lyrics to her covers, but as I don’t speak French, I can’t tell if that’s the case with Palladium.  Here’s both versions.  Maybe one of my French-speaking friends can shed some light?
Liz Brady – Palladium by hells-belles

The Sparkles – The Hip by hells-belles

Liz Brady – Palladium | The Sparkles – The Hip

[Liz Brady - buy]

Thanks to Ready Steady Girls for the extensive Liz Brady bio.

Various house moves and the general stingy sizes of any affordable flats within the M25 have pretty much decimated my vinyl collection, so my quest to replace my favourite tunes on vinyl continues.  This time round I’ve been going for  45s rather than albums.  Not the most economical way to go about it, but a hell of a lot easier to carry.  So rock and roll.

I’ve always loved “The Magic Touch” by The Bobby Fuller Four (him of “I Fought The Law” fame) but this stripped-down cover by Melba Moore just kills it.  I always get that eye-tingling prickle of happy tears when the chorus kicks in.  Then again, I cry when I hear “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys, so make of that what you will.

I just got this 45 this week (reissue) and am looking forward to playing it out next weekend on vinyl for the first time.  It always seems to get some bums shaking on the dancefloor at the end of the early-doors part of the evening, even amongst the “play something we know the words to” types.

Melba Moore – The Magic Touch by hells-belles

The Magic Touch

[buy]

In honour of the Hell’s Belles redesign – and because Christian asked for it – I give you a superb version of the Stones’ Paint It Black, as interpreted by sultry 60s French singer and actress Marie Laforêt.  Enjoy:

Marie Laforêt – Marie-douceur, Marie-colère (Paint It Black)

[buy]

Mad Men enthusiasts looking for a musical equivalent of Betty Draper need look no further than Julie London.  She’s probably best known for lounge-tastic numbers like the mid-50s “Cry Me A River”, but she’d become decidedly slinkier by the time she recorded her 29th- and  final – album for Liberty Records in 1969.

“Yummy, Yummy, Yummy” is one of my favourite Julie tracks.  As a kid, I’d always loved the original bubblegum version by The Ohio Express (the one 8-track (!) tape my grandma had that wasn’t Barry Manilow), but Julie’s version, with her languid vocals and louche string arrangements, twists the sickly-sweet original into a super-saucy gem.

I first came across this track via the bootleg Lux ‘n Ivy’s Favourites compilation series.  As far as I know, it’s only been re-issued as a Japanese import in 1995.  The prices have since come down, but it looks like it may be out of print again (Amazon has only 2 copies and the rest are private sellers) so if you like what you hear, snap this one up quick.

Julie London – Yummy, Yummy, Yummy by hells-belles

MP3: Julie London – Yummy, Yummy, Yummy

Julie London on eMusic