Serge Gainsbourg EPs, Non-LP singles & Soundtracks

[HWright]

To fans of Serge Gainsbourg, French singer-songwriter:

I've been a fan for some time but recently I decided to collect his original French albums on Phillips. I have the first five, dating from 1959-1964. They're all quite good, very jazz influenced, somewhat like Frank Sinatra or Charles Aznavour. However, based on information on the web, it turns out that during the same period Gainsbourg also recorded a number of EPs, non-LP singles and tracks for movie soundtracks. Some of these songs are among his best. I know this because before I bought the original albums on CD I bought a two disc best of which included some of them.

My question here is: have these "loose" songs ever been collected in one place? Or does one have to buy one of these enormous 10 disc box sets to get them?

(Incidentally, I do realize that some of these songs may be collected on the three single disc best of collections that were released in the USA a few years back, but I'm not interested in those collections since most of what's on them is from the first 5 or 6 original albums. )

[brownie]

The following Serge Gainsbourg website should give you a lot of informations. It includes a discography:

http://www.gainsbourg.org/

To view details on the various vinyls inside La Discographie Complete, click on '33 Tours'...

There was a pretty complete 3CD album of Gainsbourg's film music that came out a couple of years ago:

http://www.fnac.com/Shelf/article.asp?PRID...5ae9d8d7c6&Fr=0

Edited February 10, 2005 by brownie

[HWright]

Brownie:

Thanks. I hadn't seen that site before.

Even thought the soundtrack material is available (as you point out), it doesn't look like there is a collection of the other "loose" material.

To be more specific, I'm in particular interested in an EP Gainsbourg put out in 1963 called "Vilaine filles, mauvais garçons."

It includes 4 tracks not included on any LP as far as I can tell:

Vilaine filles, mauvais garçons

L'appareil à sous

La javanaise

Un violon, un jambon

I've heard "La javanaise" on my two-disc best of set and if its quality is any indicator, this collection should be as good as anything else SG did during that period.

Edited February 11, 2005 by HWright