Lizzy Mercier Descloux, whose real name is Martine-Elisabeth Mercier, was a French singer who began her artistic career by attending the Beaux-Arts in Paris.
After a stint in the United States in the mid-1970s where she immersed herself in punk and New-Wave circles, she wrote for the specialist magazine Rock News. She writes there articles which will make it possible to make known her new musical movements.
It was in 1978 that things took off when she recorded her first album "Rosa Yemen" with guitarist Dj Banes. Followed a year later in 1979 by his first album, this time solo, "Press color". Album which will unfortunately go almost unnoticed.
Far from being discouraged, in 1981 she released the album "Mambo Nassau", with multicolored and multi-racial influences. Album which allows him to pass on CBS and to record a nice esteem success.
But it was her trip to Africa during 1983, and especially the influences that she brought back from it, that will allow her to finally experience success with the release of the album "Mais où sont passées les gazelles". Album from which the single of the same name will be extracted, a single that will be a hit in France and which will finally bring her the long-awaited recognition.
Short-lived recognition because not everything that comes out later will allow him to experience the same level of success. A great adventure that unfortunately came to an end in 2004 when she died of cancer at the age of just 47 years old.
To discover or rediscover.
Discography (among others ...) :
Fire 1979
Mission impossible 1979
Funky stuff 1981
Five troubles mambo 1981
Mister Soweto 1982
Maita 1983
Mais où sont passées les gazelles 1984
Fog horn blues 1986
Calypso moguls 1986
Salomé 1988
Clips :
1979 ... the surrealist beginnings. Yes, yes, it's the same one that we will find a few years later looking for gazelles ...
1979 ... just for the record, a cover of the cult credits composed by Lalo Schifrin. Strange appearance on this single ...
1981 ... the beginning of the 1980s, perfectly in line with the musical standards of the moment. On a funky and rhythmic track. Unfortunately, it still won't take off ...
1981 ... then the sound begins to change. No more funk sounds, here come the afro_caribéennes sounds. A transition that will rather succeed ...
1982 ... she tests, she mixes up, she looks for herself in an obvious way. But she will not be long in finding herself, that is clear !
1984 ... then THIS title comes ! The title that will change everything, her life, her destiny and make her one of the phenomena of the moment. She signs here quite simply one of the biggest hits of the decade on the French side, a light, fresh and airy title just as it should be. MAS-TER-FUL !
1986 ... the rest is nice, of course, but she is unable to repeat the feat of 1984. Like many colleagues of the time, a meteoric success followed by such a meteoric fall. Hard law of the trade ...
1988 ... a completely incomprehensible sound reorientation that no longer sticks to current standards at all. A fishtail end of adventure that is difficult to understand. The freshness and carefree that characterized her are gone. Pity...
Wiki :
Greatest Hits :
Discography :