Favorite Non American Songs

[GoblinCampFollower]

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

An absolutely French classic chanson by Joe Dassin, one of the biggest chansonniers ever although he was an born in New York City.

 

[Sid]

Okay, one more summer hit in the Netherlands:

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

Middle English?

 

[Sid]

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

The scandal song of 1969 in France and more.

 

[Sid]

That song was considered coming straight from Sodom and Gomorrah in those days.
No when you hear an average song in the hitparade these days, it was nothing.

 

[Luisa Land]

And now we remember three Dutch girls, nederlands meisjes, who scored a huge hit in Europe a long time ago with "Missisippi."
Unfortunately, I have not found a version in Dutch, let alone in Limburgish, where the three sisters are at home (like Sid):

 

[Sid]

Pussycat was a band with almost all the members coming from my hometown, or from the region. They scored 4 big hits in total in some parts of the world, with Mississippi being the biggest one. Their songs never made it into the American charts though.
The three singers are sisters. The one on the left had a café for many years in my hometown after the band split up.

The lead singer Tonny (Toni) Willé had her son attending our school. She even gave a Christmas concert with our children's school choir to raise some extra money for a school project. I had the honor to present that show back then. Unbelievable that a woman that toured half the world with her band (Mississipi was a number 1 hit in 14 countries) could be so nervous before a show for only children and parents from our school. The concert was a great success. A great voice.

I don't think that there is a Dutch version.
Singing in Dutch is most of the time no advantage to score a hit single in NL.
Although this one made it (pretty much out of the blue) to the number 1 possition in our charts recently (Leaving Ed Sheeran and The Bieber behind on 2 and 3).


(The title translates as: I'm go swimmin' in Baccardi Lemon).

 

[Free]

Just some modern pop-style music from a South Korean bass player...

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

More Dutch artists, first: Luv. This was a pop band of three women, mostly wearing sexy clothes and very simple lyrics. This video surprisingly has everything: bag pipes, Dutch ladies, flippers and even the smurfs.

The Cats with "One way wind". Very well known for some songs.

Same song, same artist but this time in German.

 

[Sid]

The Cats had style. 36 singles in the Dutch Top 40, 19 of them top 10 hits and 5 number 1 songs. And great live performers.
Luv not so much, but they had the looks and legs.

- - - - - - - - -

Here is a real big one in Europe from the past, with an encore at the end of a show. He always did that in his white bathrobe.
Always the same medley with some of his hits.

This is from his farewell concert in Zürich 2014. A few months later he died while walking in a park near his home a few days before Christmas.
He is 80 years in this video: Udo Jürgens (Austria/Switserland)



If you can present your hits in medleys during a concert and then even have some left for the encore, you know you are a big one!

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

The Cats had style. 36 singles in the Dutch Top 40, 19 of them top 10 hits and 5 number 1 songs. And great live performers.
Luv not so much, but they had the looks and legs.

Here is a real big one in Europe from the past, with an encore at the end of a show. He always did that in his white bathrobe.
Always the same medley with a some of his hits.

Well Luv was build around the simple and well functioning concept sex sells, and they had enough commercial success. Some nice, catchy tunes, they never hurt anybodies feelings and clean image, so a nice fluffy scandal free feel good band with matching music, which everybody likes to enjoy now and then.

Udo Jürgens was one of the living legends and giants of the German music scene. He always sung live, wrote most of the songs by himself and was able to perform on the grand piano. Also his lyrics often were quite critical about certain topics, like double standards and so on. And he sold over 100 million records, which is a lot!

By the way the white bathrobe became a tradition in his live shows because in 1969 he want on tournee throughout Europe starting in Hamburg. The concert was already over since 15 minutes, but people were still cheering for an encore, so Jürgens left his stage room robe just in a white bath robe and delivered it. Since then it was a tradition on many of his live concerts.

One his English songs named "The Music Played", the German version is "Was ich dir sagen will." That song though was made popular by Matt Monro in the English world, but Jürgens is its creator.

Same song performed by Matt Monro:

There's also a Spanish, Greek and Finnish version around. Probably many other languages as well I am unaware about.

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

Reinhard Mey, one of the greatest living German singer-songwriters. Sings mostly in German, but also French, English and Dutch.


His most famous song, "Über den Wolken", "Au dessus des nuages" or "Boven de Wolken."

And of course - German songs with long long words:

 

[Bartholomew Gallacher]

A very strange but alluring fusion of folk music with rock elements and yodel. And yes, that dialect is even hard to understand for most Germans.

 

[Kamilah Hauptmann]

So Yugoslavia had a massive synthwave music scene encouraged by the Communist Party as a thing for the youth to move on from the old stodgy communist anthems (The party also considered punk as a useful critique.) Anyway, here's a sampler dish from 1984 on to about 2011 of Balkan synth:

 

[Chin Rey]

Nothing Norwegian yet?

Leaving out the heavy metal, A-ha and anything about what foxes might say.

 

[Chin Rey]

Norwegian songs part two. I got a bit carried away, sorry!

 

[Luisa Land]

 

[Clara D.]