Search - Julien Clerc :: Platinum Collection

Playful, romantic, beguiling...

Kenji | France + Wales | 02/18/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I must say at once i was introduced to Julien Clerc's music in the early 80's while briefly living in France and was soon impressed enough to buy one album, without making any great effort at further exploration. I remember a cynical friend (very unfairly) likened his quivering voice to a goat! Back in the country 24 years on, i wondered whether he was still going. With a full 60 songs from a now very long and distinguished career, fitting together here so naturally you shouldn't feel the dreaded need to skip tracks, this collection gives a resounding answer.



Starting in 1968, the first disc is enjoyable for its precocious musicality, its youthful sense of freedom and adventure (a playful mix of dolphins, sea chanties, elephants, skating on ice, hippy musical, love and travel..); the second, from '75 to '82, a quiet consolidation with no loss of charm or passion; the third perhaps most impressive, for its melodic strength and ballads which unfold their warm seductive beauty on repeated listens. If the second half of his career has been rather less prolific, it seems that far from stagnating or declining Clerc has ripened like fine wine to enhance a now tremendous catalogue.



I suppose the overall style might be compared to a mix of famous international artists such as Elton John, The Beatles, Paul Simon, Julio Iglesias, Cat Stevens and Barry Manilow, but this would do no justice to its own distinctive Gallic flavour- a mischievous concoction with a pirate's dash of tropical exoticism. If you like most or all the above artists (i'm a fan of the first 2 named) you should certainly appreciate Julien Clerc, but i feel his music should appeal not only to middle-aged fogeys like me but to sensitive and adventurous romantics in general. My wife is smitten. I hope this beguiling album will transport you too to a starlit Paris and to happy, deep and even sexy places beyond."