'Un vague à l'âme' say the French in their wonderfully poetic way with expressions of feelings. A vagueness in the soul? Or a wave, like a spell of bad weather or the sea breaking on the shores of the soul? Anyway, it's what the French call the blues - not the type of music, but the type of feeling.

There's a Parisian way for everything, including feeling blue. After work you wander round town, listlessly down some boulevard or other. In a café or brasserie, tourists speak slow, loud English to streetwise waiters and you hope they don't recognise you as one of them.

The metro is full of tired, sad-eyed office workers going home; the Parisian working rhythm is metro-boulot-dodo (metro-job-sleep). In each station, drunks bed down on benches. Everyone seems down on their luck, daydreaming.

A famous scene in Louis Malle's 'Ascenseur Pour L'Echafaud' (Lift To The Scaffold) captures the vague à l'âme perfectly. You may know it: Jeanne Moreau traipses along la rue, dawdling in front of shop windows and weaving around strolling couples. The soundtrack - sad, worn-out trumpeting - is by Miles Davis, from the period when he held court in Saint-Germain, once the jazz strip of Paris but now a rosary of boutique after boutique.

Both the film and soundtrack are marvellous. Here's the scene we were talking about:

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Critically-acclaimed French conceptual electronica producer Hector Zazou doesn't look too pleased with your CLUAS Foreign Correspondent (Paris).

It's April 2007 in the bar of La Flèche d'Or, the French capital's popular alt-music venue, just after a concert by Nina Hynes. In a sudden fit of professionalism, your Paris correspondent has decided to get a few words (and, more importantly, the set-list) from Ireland's astral-pop princess. We spot her in the bar, deep in conversation with someone or other but we resolve not to let social etiquette get in the way of our duty to the CLUAS readership.

As politely as possible, your blogger butts in to ask Nina some questions. The guy she's talking with (youthful-looking fiftysomething, bespectacled, neatly-trimmed grey hair and beard) looks a bit taken aback, but still offers us a polite 'bonsoir' as Hynes introduces him.

His name, Hector Zazou, is familiar to us. His 1994 album 'Songs From The Cold Seas' is something of a cult classic - electronic treatments of folk songs from Alaska, Siberia and the Arctic regions, sung by the likes of Bjork, John Cale, Suzanne Vega and Siouxsie - as well as astounding vocal performances by native traditional singers. Fans of Sigur Ros and their gorgeous icy bleakness probably already know and love it. Zazou recounts the geographical and technical challenges of making this album (for instance, why you should never record an album in the Hebrides, unless you fancy spending all day in a toilet) in a fascinating 1995 interview with Sound On Sound Magazine.

How come he's chatting to Nina Hynes? Well, she sung a track called 'Under My Wing' on Zazou's 2003 album 'Strong Currents', as part of an all-female vocal line-up including the likes of Jane Birkin, Laurie Anderson and Lisa Gerrard. It's a matter of speculation as to which of them (if any) owns the female bottom that graces one version of the album's cover.

In 1998, between 'Songs From The Cold Seas' and 'Strong Currents', Zazou recorded and released an album of traditional Celtic music entitled 'Lights In The Dark, featuring vocals by Katie McMahon, Breda Mayock and Lasairfhiona Ni Chonaola. The album sleeve does not feature any ladybuttocks, but rather a glowing crucifix on a black background that bears a remarkable similarity to the cover of Justice's 2007 debut long-player.

Zazou is back in the news with the release of his new album, 'Corps Electriques' (left). Recorded in the studios of Radio France in Paris, and leaning towards electro post-rock with its distortion and dark vibes, the record features former Daisy Chainsaw singer Katie Jane Garside, Norwegian jazzman Niels Petter-Molvaer, American singer-songer Lone Kent and occasional R.E.M. drummer Bill Rieflin.

It's an impressive piece of soundscaping. You can listen to tracks on the album's dedicated MySpace page.

If Nina Hynes doesn't feature this time around, that may be because Hector Zazou just didn't get a chance to ask her. Perhaps something - or someone - got in his way.

Here's a clip of Zazou and Bjork in the studio, recording 'Visur Vatnsenda-Rosu' for the 'Songs For The Cold Seas' album:

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We're not too enthusiastic about French indie's current flavour of the month, The Dø, back from last weekend's Eurosonic festival to blanket media coverage and radio playlisting in France.

By contrast, we'd much rather rave about The Dodoz (right), who even by their name alone are twice the band that The Dø are. We don't have to cut and paste obscure letters to write their nom de rock, or worry if we're pronouncing it correctly. And that 'z' must count for something too.

From Toulouse, they make a joyous indie-punk-pop racket. The foursome first came to prominence last September when they supported Siouxsie at her album showcase in (of all places) the Eiffel Tower.

Since then they've been snapped up by Nude Records (home of Suede) and their first single will be released in the UK in March. 'Do You Like Boys?' features lead singer Geraldine answering her own question in unequivocal fashion: "I HATE BOYS!" Let all French pop singles in 2008 be as glorious as this.

Tonight in the French capital The Dodoz are supporting those irritating English airplay-squatters The Hoosiers (bleurgh) at La Maroquinerie. Fortunately, in February they'll have better luck with their headliners, for they'll be opening for Babyshambles (whose 'Shotters Nation' was a fine album) in Paris and Lyon. After that, their own headline shows and world domination.

No news yet of Irish releases or dates for The Dodoz; we'll pass on any info ASAP. In the meantime, have a listen to some tracks on their MySpace page. Here they are on video, performing 'Do You Like Boys?' live. Just give them 30 seconds to get ready, okay?

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Halfway down the Champs-Elysées there's a huge statue of Charles de Gaulle. It captures the General in his glorious moment as he strode down the grand old boulevard on 26 August 1945, the symbolic act which confirmed the liberation of Paris from the Nazi forces. On the statue's plinth are engraved his famous words from that day: "Paris! Paris outragée! Paris brisée! Paris martyrisée! Mais Paris libérée!" (Paris outraged! Paris broken! Paris martyrised! But Paris free!). It's an evocative blend of suffering and triumph, of tragic history and glorious destiny - and it's almost impossible to read those words without hearing in your mind's ear the opening bars of 'Je Ne Regrette Rien' as sung by Edith Piaf. Like de Gaulle, Piaf's singing more than symbolises France - it seems to embody it.

No doubt there'll be resurgent interest in Piaf now, thanks to Marion Cotillard's Golden Globe-winning portrayal of her in 'La Vie En Rose'. Strangely, that's not the film's title in France - here it's called 'La Mome', which means anything from 'the kid' to 'the chick' to 'the sweetheart'.

Cynics may sneer that Piaf's melodramatic life makes for lazy cinema; just point the camera at her squalid upbringing, triumphant success, tragic romance with the ill-fated Marcel Cernan (and his own glamorous world of '50s middleweight boxing) and the last years of sad decline, and the story will tell itself. And isn't Hollywood currently obsessed with rewarding biopic roles that are often just glorified impersonations? With beautiful actresses making themselves up as unglamorous, long-suffering heroines? Despite all that, Cotillard is a fine actress and fully deserves international recognition.

Piaf certainly merits lasting worldwide fame - and her singing is matched by her acting. That is to say, few other singers bring such dramatic range and emotional strength to their performances - and (even more rare) Piaf did it in both English and French with nothing lost in translation. Her most famous international songs are 'Je Ne Regrette Rien/No Regrets' and 'La Vie En Rose', but surely her greatest performance is 'Hymne A L'Amour' (sometimes known in English as 'If You Love Me' or 'Hymn To Love'). It begins with the singer reserved and hesitant with emotion, then moves into a middle section of self-questioning and fearful uncertainty, before ending with a powerful declaration of love that's as triumphant as de Gaulle's march down the Champs-Elysées.

Wouldn't it be strange if Cotillard's Piaf were to battle with Cate Blanchett's Dylan for an Oscar? Should Cate's Bob-job beat out Piaf, we can just console ourselves that there are greater prizes than shiny baubles. Here's 'Hymne A L'Amour' - if you're watching in your workplace, now would be a good time to pretend that you've got dust in your eye:

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The annual Eurosonic festival takes place this weekend (10-12 January) in Groningen in the Netherlands, as part of the Noorderslag music conference. Given the pan-continental vibe of the whole thing, it's appropriate that it kicks off with a concert by that all-inclusive Scandinavian pop collective, I'm From Barcelona.

As well as being a massive industry symposium, Eurosonic features live performances by over 250 new and emerging acts from across the continent, chosen either from applicants or those nominated to perform by the music community of their home country.

For instance, 2FM are sending Cathy Davey and Republic Of Loose on our behalf, and both Si Schroeder and Halves have also been chosen to represent Ireland. So, four fine acts representing us and themselves at Europe's most important and prestigious music showcase. G'wan Oirland!!!!

France will have 12 acts at Eurosonic - and, as you'd expect, France's position as market leader in electronica will be emphasised during the showcase. Irish music fans may know TTC, who played at The Village in Dublin last May. That is, a small number of Irish music fans - as Nialler9 tells it, there were only around 70 or 80 punters on the night, many of whom were falling-around drunk. Anyway, TTC contributors Para One and Orgasmic will DJ at a special night for Teki Latex's label, Institubes, which will also include turns from DJs Bobmo and Surkin.

Readers of this blog (a bit classier and more numerous than those TTC fans, we're glad to say) will recognise the name of electro-disco-poppeuse Yelle, whose colourful and hyperactive 'Pop-Up' featured in our list of Best French Albums of 2007.

Other French electro at Eurosonic '08 includes the Krautrock-influenced Zombie-Zombie, the hardcore techno of DJ and producer Leonard de Leonard, Greek-born singer Olga Kouklaki and the Latino-flavoured P18 project of Tom Darnal, formerly of Manu Chao's old band Mano Negra.

As for the indie kids, Franco-Finnish duo The Dø (pronounced 'doh' like the first note of the musical scale) are currently enjoying massive radio exposure in France with their debut single 'On My Shoulders'.

Singer Olivia Merilahti's blackboard-scraping voice may grate the nerves, but in a post-Blunt world anything goes. Expect to hear them (pictured left) on your Eire-waves during 2008.

The two lads in AaRON (that's how it must be written) were shortlisted for the 2007 Prix Constantin, France's equivalent of the Choice and Mercury prizes. They scored a sizeable hit with their maudlin piano ballad 'Lili', which will probably be a big hit with the SHUSH!-ers at Groningen and beyond.

Acoustic singer-songer Soko gained a cult following with her song 'I'll Kill Her', which became something of an internet hit in France last year. She can't sing and the song is a half-written shambles... but it seems that a venomous chorus is enough to sway large numbers of French indie fans. 

To pick one of that French contingent for international success in deux mille huit, our preference would be Yelle or the TTC lads... but realism dictates that we go for The Do. Doh! We mean, The Dø. Anyway, here's them live in Bordeaux playing 'On My Shoulders'. It has already featured in a French TV ad for stationery, but we hear it more as the soundtrack to some US series where the happy-go-lucky heroine is having boy trouble:

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In France these days it's nothing but Sarko, Sarko, Sarko. The French president seems to be on the cover of every magazine, usually a flattering portrait with a sycophantic headline like 'The Sarkozy Enigma' or 'Sarkozy: How Does He Do It?' or 'Sarkozy: Behind The Scenes'. Even if you don't read these magazines, their posters are plastered on the kiosks that line the larger Paris boulevards. It's all unavoidable.

All this Sarko-mania stepped up a gear with news of his romance with former model and singer Eva Brauni - sorry, we mean Carla Bruni. It now seems that they will get married on 9 February; will it be a national holiday? The ceremony live on TV? And will Carla's new album, due for release later this year, be played on all state occasions?

But the future French First Lady is not the only pop star in the family - it seems that we've been listening to the Sarkozy clan's musical efforts for quite a while without realising it. French press reports that Pierre Sarkozy, 23, works as a rap producer under the name of Mosey.

Even better, Mosey/Sarko Jr (left, with Timbaland) has produced tracks for French rapper Poison, who happens to write hardcore anti-Sarkozy lyrics such as "anti-Sarko / anti-right / Nicolas don't you hear? / We're anti-you".

France has a piece of legislation on its statute books, the French Press Freedom Law of 1881, which outlaws insults to the President. The last known enforcement of this law was in the mid-60s, when a heckler was arrested for booing General de Gaulle as he drove along the Champs-Elysées in the Bastille Day parade.

While Interior Minister, just until his election as President, Nicolas Sarkozy is believed to have initiated the prosecution of several hardcore French rappers for the violent anti-police nature of their lyrics.

In one high-profile case during 2006 and early 2007, two French MPs of Sarkozy's UMP party brought charges of incitement to hatred and sexism against a rapper called Monsieur R, whose single 'FranSSe' featured a video with topless dancers (female, of course) in front of the national flag, and whose lyrics inferred that France was a 'salope' (slut). The twin capital S in the song's title reflects the track's comparison of France's governing class with the Nazi regime. Monsieur R also raps that he 'pisses on Napoleon and General de Gaulle'.

Both charges were thrown out of court. It remains to be seen if young Sarkozy will face similar court action for helping those who diss his old man, president of France. 

(On a slightly-related point of freedom of expression, we sincerely recommend Aoife McIndieHour's excellent article on an imprisoned Saudi blogger, based on Aoife's own experiences of growing up in Saudi Arabia)

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Brrrrr, etc. It's bbbbloody ffffreezing here in Paris - certainly no weather to be standing around outside cafés and bars. But that's the predicament of France's smokers, now that the new smoking ban is in force.

As your blogger (finger on the French pulse) predicted, there's been a vociferous minority of discontented fumeurs and fumeuses. One Lyon watering-hole, Cafe 203 (right), has declared itself a 'resistant' smoking zone, walls decorated with Warhol-esque screen prints of full ashtrays so as to invoke the defence that it's in the name of culture. But the regulation has been broadly accepted and most die-hard smokers are grudgingly accepting the new regime.

One drawback is that the beautiful streets of Paris are now crowded with smokers, their smoke and their stubbed-out fag-butts. Pushing our way to Gare Saint-Lazare this evening was like pushing our way through a crowded pre-2008 Paris café.

The smoking ban is still the talk of France - that and the Sarko-Carla love story. Potentially capitalising on this cigarette-centric attention is a rather fine 8-piece group from Lille with a name that's topical (for all you multi-linguist Francophile pop fans out there) but terrible.

Roken Is Dodelijk (left) is what they're called. French music fans who've ever smoked in Amsterdam [Careful now! - CLUAS Legal Department] will recognise this as the anti-smoking warning on Dutch cigarette packets. It means 'Smoking Is Deadly' - that's 'deadly' not in the Dublin sense of "Bleedin' rapid, Outspan!" but in the original meaning of 'may induce mortality'. (On a connected linguistic note, hip young French people use 'mortel' to mean 'deadly'/'brilliant' too)

Happily, their songwriting is better than their naming. Their eponymous first
EP came out recently and it's stuffed with brilliant acoustic indie-folk-pop tunes. You can check them out at the band's very witty (in French) MySpace page (Gerard Houllier and Jacques Brel, amongst others, have something to say about the band). Here's the video for 'Good Enough':

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Who was the first international leader seen by new French president Nicolas Sarkozy following his inauguration in June?

Chancellor Merkel? Nein! President Bush? Nope! Prime Minister Blair or Brown? Sorry, old chap!

The answer? CLUAS founder and editor Eoghan O’Neill.

This is absolutely true: after the inauguration ceremony at the Elysée Palace, Sarko’s cavalcade was driving up the Champs-Elysées. Just before reaching the Arc de Triomphe for a wreath-laying ceremony, the pint-sized president (right) suddenly hopped out of his state car and rushed over to the crowds lining the grand old boulevard – straight to where the CLUAS gaffer (on a flying visit to the French capital) happened to be standing. One international statesman had recognised another, a fellow, a peer.

We’re not sure what advice, if any, our leader gave France’s; suffice it to say that not long afterwards Sarkozy was picking fights with the transport unions, physically confronting US paparazzi and throwing over his wife for a younger model/singer who had got a positive review on CLUAS (and she plans to release a new album of ‘love songs’ in 2008; the mind boggles).

Your Paris correspondent, not privileged to be in attendance at this Franco-Irish summit meeting, carried on through 2007 sketching the Venn diagram where ‘Irish music’ overlaps with ‘French music’. And such was the high level of activity there that our leisurely monthly column had to become a busy blog in order to cope. The Latin Quarter of CLUAS turned into something of a cultural meeting-point where green mixed with blue, pints were shared and croissants were broken in brotherhood.

The only major Irish sporting success in France this year came in October, when the Aidan O’Brien-trained Dylan Thomas won the Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, the country’s most prestigious horse race – and even then it looked as if officious French stewards would deny the Irish their win. (Oh, and your blogger NAILED the Paris Marathon.)

Our musicians fared much better on French soil. A plethora of Irish acts played in Paris during 2007: the French capital is now firmly established on the itinerary of any Irish band with ambitions of international success. In fact, we know of a Paris-based Irish agency, Oileán Promotions, which specialises in bringing acts over from Éire to play in France. And another Paris-based Irishman, Perry Blake, consolidated his French and international success with his seventh studio album, ‘Canyon Songs’.

This year there were Paris appearances by Duke Special, Nina Hynes, Simple Kid, The Immediate, The Thrills, The Frank And Walters, Sinead O’Connor, Roisin Murphy, The Answer and Neosupervital, amongst others. Outside the capital, Snow Patrol and The Divine Comedy played in provincial summer festivals.

In particular, Simple Kid and Duke Special gave remarkable Paris performances. Nina Hynes’ two concerts here suffered the misfortune of technical problems for the first gig and a transport strike for the second, yet the princess of Irish astral-pop put on two highly entertaining shows. The Immediate’s springtime shows in Paris proved to be among their last live appearances before the band broke up soon thereafter – snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, as the band’s French distributor had just blitzed the record shops and music press of Paris.

Plenty of French acts made the journey in the opposite direction and played to Irish audiences, most notably Justice (three times), Daft Punk, Manu Chao, The Teenagers, Nouvelle Vague (twice), Cassius, Emily Loizeau and Les Rita Mitsouko.

And Dublin now has something of a French scene; in 2007 we featured popular club nights such as French Friday and La Nuit Blanche, as well as Dublin-based French rocker Lauren Guillery. Irish acts are getting in on all this Frenchness too – the video for 'Love Like Nicotine' by Dark Room Notes recreated the famous dance scene from Jean-Luc Godard’s 'Bande À Parte', while Snow Patrol took a high-speed drive around a deserted early-morning Paris in their video for 'Open Your Eyes'.

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