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The first of France's major summer music festivals to announce its 2010 bill is Les Vieilles Charrues. The annual trip to Carhaix in Brittany takes place on 15-18 July.

You might remember that last year's event featured Bruce Springsteen in his only French show of 2009. This year's stars are not as legendary but still attractive enough to ensure a healthy turnout.

Top of the bill are Muse. Now, the English trio are playing two huge concerts at the Stade de France in Paris this June, so it might seem strange that they play another large French show only weeks later. However, Les Vieilles Charrues attracts fans for the unique experience of a festival in the remote west of Brittany - which is also relatively accessible for English fans. Also, Brittany in July is full of young holidaymakers from around Europe, so Les Vieilles Charrues has a greater potential audience than its isolated location suggests.

Back to the line-up - the other name that interests us is Phoenix. However, the Grammy winners are surprisingly far down the bill - tugging the forelock to Mika but also to four other French acts. Who are these artists that the home fans seem to prefer over Phoenix?

We featured Indochine early last year - '80s post-punk veterans who will also be filling the Stade de France this summer. Diam's is a tomboyish rapper who raised some eyebrows when she converted to Islam recently. Alain Souchon is one of these old chanson française guys that you non-Frenchies don't need to know about.

The other French headliner is Jacques Dutronc (left, in his youth). If that name sounds familiar, it's because you may have heard it in the original version of 'Brimful Of Asha' by Cornershop - at the end, when Tjindar Singh is listing his old records, he mentions "Jacques Dutronc and the Bolan boogie".

So who is Jacques Dutronc? Well, as a young man in the 1960s he was a pop star, and by the '90s he had become a respected actor. He is the partner of Françoise Hardy, perhaps France's coolest female pop singer ever - and their son Thomas Dutronc is now a star himself, making a likeable kind of jazz manouche-influenced acoustic chanson-pop.

And what does Jacques Dutronc sound like? From looking at his picture (left), you'd imagine such a suave and dapper man to croon like Bryan Ferry. In fact, Dutronc père has a rasping, hectoring voice, like a hoarse Mick Jagger. Indeed, his '60s hits bring a touch of Stones raucousness to the chanson française genre - lots of words and little melody, but with enough attitude to compensate.

As for other acts at Les Vieilles Charrues, dance music fans will recognise Vitalic and Etienne de Crécy. Revolver make a rather nice skiffle-pop sound. But you don't need to bother with Gojira or Gaetan Roussel. And if you're travelling all the way to deepest Brittany to see one-hit-wonder Mr Oizo, him of the Flat Eric fad in 1998, then you've got issues.

On which point, how does one get to deepest Brittany and Les Vieilles Charrues? First you go to a major west Breton town like Lorient or Brest (by air), Roscoff (by ferry) or Guingamp (by train). From there, the regional authority has organised coaches to Carhaix for only €3 return. Full practical details are available here in English.

Tickets for Les Vieilles Charrues went on sale last week and already all 35,000 four-day tickets have been sold - unless you choose a four-day package including transport to and from faraway French cities like Dijon or Toulouse. Never mind - you can still get a three-day pass for €88 or a one-day ticket from €37.50 to €51.20, depending on which day you choose. Muse are playing on Thursday 15 July and Phoenix on Saturday 17 July (with Indochine headlining that night). You can find full ticket details on French online ticket agents like FNAC.

For more information on the festival, check out Les Vieilles Charrues' website (in French apart from the practical info page in the link above). Here's a pleasantly bizarre song from Jacques Dutronc that Neil Hannon has been known to perform live - 'Les Playboys':

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A review of the album 'It's Blitz!' by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Review Snapshot: Have Karen O’s NY art-rock knuckleheads sold their guitars and bought turntables?

The Cluas Verdict? 7.5 out of 10

Full Review:

“It’s Sh*t!”

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The most prominent Irish act in France this month is Declan de Barra. The Waterford man is here for a series of shows around the country between now and May.

We've featured de Barra (right) on this blog before - he performs frequently in France, most notably a recent Paris show on the same bill as alt-country legend Josh T. Pearson. He's also been picking up good reviews from the native press.

Fans of acoustic singer-songering will certainly be impressed by de Barra's intensity and poeticism. So far he's made two albums - a 2005 release called 'Song Of A Thousand Birds' and its 2008 follow-up 'A Fire To Scare The Sun' - and alt-folk aficionados should check them out.

On his current spin around la hexagone, de Barra visits places such as Saint Brieuc, Lens and Saint Etienne. This Friday, 12 March, he has a show in the Paris region, at Les Mains d'Oeuvres in Saint-Ouen (not far from the Stade de France).

Full details of his tour, his life and his works are available on Declan de Barra's MySpace page. No news yet of any upcoming gigs back in the E.I.R.E.

Here's a striking video of Declan de Barra from a previous Paris visit. French music website Le Hiboo ('the owl') filmed him singing a capella at the Madeleine, a famous church just off the Place de la Concorde. He's singing 'Throw Your Arms Around Me', a favourite among his fans - and he's in his bare feet on the marble floor. We feel the cold just looking at him:

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Dateline: crack of dawn last Saturday morning. While you were snuggled up all warm in bed, your Seine-side correspondent staggered sleepily across town, up to the Gare du Nord and onto a train. Two hours later, we arrived at St Pancras station. That's how easy it is to go from Paris to London.

It was actually your blogger's first time there. The immediate reason for our long-overdue London debut was a match of rugby at Twickenham, so it was certainly a successful trip. But London made a big impression.

Paris is probably the most beautiful city in the world - and Paris knows it. The French capital can feel quite uptight and self-conscious, as if every Parisian believes he or she lives in the cold-blooded glamour of a fashion show. The sheer beauty of the place can be intimidating, like when you visit someone's new home and fear leaving mud on their carpet. Waiters and customer service staff demand respect for their authority, and the omnipresent French flags suggest an irritation with anything different or foreign. It's hard work to relax in Paris.

By contrast, London was warm and human. Its streets feel practical and lived in, like a comfortable pair of shoes. Compared to the hassle of Paris cafés, London pubs are blissful and kind. And even its monuments are idiosyncratic - despite their functionality and familiarity, Tower Bridge and the Houses of Parliament still seem so odd.

Pop music gives us proof of London's warmth and Paris's cold. There are hardly any French pop songs about Paris - certainly nothing contemporary or cool. Rap acts may rap about Paris - but only as political commentary, not as praise.

By contrast, London has been apotheosised in countless songs by its natives and residents. Waterloo Station and the nearby bridge are quite unremarkable, yet Ray Davies featured them in one of pop's most poetic songs. The Clash, The Jam, Madness and Blur have added their own layers to London's pop mythology by singing of ordinary places like Camden Town, the Tube, Hammersmith and Primrose Hill. (Of course, Paris has no pop/rock anthem to match 'London Calling'.)

Paris has inspired great painting, literature and classical music - but it has no great pop music. North American songwriters like Joni Mitchell and Stephin Merritt use Paris as shorthand for artistic freedom and old-fashioned romance respectively, but those are outsider images with little relevance to daily life Seine-side. The city's only native pop genius, Serge Gainsbourg, recorded his classic late-'60s records - including 'Je T'Aime (Moi Non Plus)' - in London and filled his lyrics with American pop culture references. There's very little of Paris in Serge's masterworks. And as we've pointed out before, the entire 'French Touch' wave of mid-'90s indietronic culture - Daft Punk, Air, Michel Gondry, Phoenix - come from Versailles. 

Why is Paris so poor for pop? Well, it might be due to that intimidating air of cold-blooded glamour we mentioned earlier. Pop music is democratic and open-minded and human and un-self-conscious and fun - and Paris is none of these things. But London seems to have these qualities in abundance, hence it's the pop capital of the world.

So, is your correspondent in the wrong city? Well, that's a question for another time... Anyway, thinking of London and the future leads us nicely to four lads from Colchester who made a classic London single and video - here's Blur with 'For Tomorrow':

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