Dr. Demento has played this title for years, usually near Valentine’s day. It’s soft instrumental music over a lovers’ dialog in French–and even to someone who doesn’t understand French it seems obvious what they’re doing at the end.
But I’m not quite sure how to translate the title, which comes out, more or less literally, as “I love you, neither do I,” or something. I couldn’t grasp the intended meaning of the title in the original French.
Nor am I sure of the spelling of the performers’ names–which I spelled as Jane Burken and Serge Gainesbourg.
Any info?
Possibly “Je t’aime, mais non plus.”
Which would mean, “I love you, but not that much.”
Just a WAG.
The performers on ‘Je t’aime, moi non plus’ were Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin. They were an item at the time of the recording.
Gainsbourg originally wanted Brigitte Bardot to ‘sing’ the female vocal but La Bardot was unwilling to simulate the sounds of sexual congress.
The song was released in the UK on the Fontana label in 1969 and was banned by the BBC. Fontana then deleted the release from their lists.
The publicity surrounding the record prompted other labels to take it on, after which it swept to No. 1 all over Europe.
As far as I am aware the title translates as ‘I love you, me neither.’
Yep, Nostradamus is right. Gainsbourg had the reputation of being the “bad boy” of French music. If you think that the outcry for that song was bad, you should have heard what they said when he made a reggae version of La Marsellaise. :eek: