I went to the Scala to see current French Sensation ZAZ without ever having heard a note of her music but with hopes that the Scala would have an atmosphere approaching the one at the last French gig I went to there. On that occasion I was there to see what turned out to be the last London show by Les Rita Mitsouko just a couple of weeks before Fred Chichin's death. I was hoping Zaz might be along those lines with maybe some Stinky Toys and Marie Et Les Garcons thrown in for good measure. That was not to be the case but I can dream, I guess.
Now I will warn all of our French speaking readers my French is as bad if not worse than Zaz's English N'est pas. Still on getting to the guest-list window I was very happy to be given a wristband allowing me into the Glass bar where all drinks are free! A great way to get reviewers on-side. So I spent some time in there, while the band was setting up. I had missed Fletcher's opening set.
I got down into the main hall just before Zaz came on and unlike at the Les Rita Mitsouko gig, I could actually make my way through the crowd to get a nice spot but they were up for it from the moment Zaz and her 4 piece band came on. The first song was pretty much a scat jazz meets chanson thing that saw Zaz get the place going and put a smile on the faces of everyone I could see this was very dance-y in an old time 50's Jazz dance kind of way like we are somewhere off Montmartre in a fog of Gauloise smoke with Francoise Hardy and in some ways the Scala is the perfect venue for that with its history.
The second song that had a lot of Comme ce comme ca's and Amore in it had a more up-beat and honky tonk vibe to it like we had strolled round to Rue Pigalle. There's a bit of a modern edge to it but they never really play anything that you couldn't have heard in 1959 and there is nothing wrong with that.
Zaz introduced the next song as Ca Va or Contradiction in English I think. It was the first song she crowd-sourced a translation for! It had a great happy summer by the beach kind of vibe to it like one of those tunes you'd come back from a trip with it stuck in your head as the coolest song you heard but had no idea who it's by. Most of the audience were singing along, it also had some nice accordion on it as well.
Zaz then slowed things down for a song I think she introduced as Parapluie that was a very dark sounding piano ballad with a real Edith Piaf feel to it which was a mood kept on Ces Petits Rien: a very wistful slow bluesy jazz song that could have been sung by Eydie Gorme By this point I had figured out who the guitarist most reminded me of. At first I was thinking Django but actually he was far more going for a Wes Montgomery kind of thing.
She then claimed the next song was a cover of Julian Cope's Treason only sung in French and with an arrangement that sounded like she thought Julian Cope was the new Steve Lawrence or something like that. Damn, it sounded good and had the place dancing. They then went properly Chanson for a cover of Frances Chabrol's Petite Marie and they did a fairly straight version of it.
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Zaz then pulled a masterstroke when she whipped out her Jews Harp and after one note of it, the place went mental for the opening notes of what turned out to be her big European hit Je Veux. It was like pandemonium for the whole song and every time she played the jews harp the place went a bit more nuts. The big solo got by far the biggest cheer of the night, which I certainly wasn't expecting; it was brilliant infectious fun.
With some audience help Zaz told us non-French speakers the next song was called Close your Eyes and Shut Your Mouth. It could have been an old 1930's jazz song or a Jacques Brel number, it was somewhere in that vein. Things then got all smokey and slow again for a song about who knows what but I think it may have had something to do with sexual desire, but don't quote me on it though.
We have all been at gigs where the band does a sing along and splits the audience in two but Zaz goes better than that and splits us in 4 and builds a 4 part harmony choir out of the audience to help back the band on what I think was Les Passants, which as this is the sort of Huge hit that has millions of hits on its youtube videos, was easy as everyone seemed to know what to do and Zaz was a brilliant conductor using her arms and gestures with her face to get us to get it right. It worked brilliantly, damn, she had us eating out of her hand.
She kept everyone singing along for a very good version of La Vie En Rose before they closed the set by having what can only be described as a washboard singalong. What a way to finish a great set. The place went far more nuts than normal London audiences do as is usual with French audiences and they made a hell of a noise before Zaz came back for an Encore.
She introduced the first song of the encore as a cover and I have to say I didn't get the title but recognized the tune. She had tried to play the drums first but they didn't get things sorted in time so at the end of that song she then grabs a set of brushes gets her microphone set up behind the drums and the drummer grabs the Washboard for a very smokey jazz tune to close the show and wish us all Au revoir.
Zaz is well worth seeing live and it's nice to see a pop sensation who is this much fun without it being aimed at teen taste. A very cool act, if you get a chance to see her European tour take it a good fun night out.
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