La Vie En Rose: Grace Jones and other takes on a lovely song

When you think of Édith Piaf, it’s hard not to think automatically of La Vie En Rose. It’s often called her signature song, and with good reason. The song inspired the title of the Oscar-winning film about her life, starring Marion Cotillard.

Eight decades on, La Vie En Rose strikes me as a kind of longing for love, sweetness and goodness in the aftermath of the Second World War. Well, that’s the reading I put it into it.

I was not aware of Grace Jones’s cover when it was released in 1977; she came into my view through her subsequent albums, when her androgynous, funky persona fit in with new wave, punk, soul and dance. Nightclubbing is one of my favourite records, and I played songs like Pull Up to the Bumper and My Jamaican Guy quite a bit in those high school and university years.

La Vie En Rose became a favourite with her compilation album Island Life, and I’ve listened to it to many, many times through the years. Not sure, why but her version is a song I love cooking to.

I’ve often read that Jones’s version is a “disco anthem,” and while this version was recorded at the height of disco, the arrangement feels more timeless to me. It uses strumming acoustic guitar, simple piano chords, articulated percussion and a relentless bass line.

And then there’s the voice of Grace Jones: it’s powerful, and she had star power out of the gate.

Incidentally, if you have the opportunity to see the 2017 documentary Grace Jones: Bloodlight and Bami, take it. Directed by Sophie Fiennes, it presents an unblinking look at Jones, who was still working and still chasing a new sound during production, and still of course expressing herself in remarkable style.

Here’s the trailer:

As for La Vie En Rose, one of the best-known versions was recorded by Louis Armstrong, whose trumpeting of the melody is just bliss.

La Vie En Rose found a new audience in 2018 with the remake of A Star is Born. Lady Gaga sings the song in a drag bar sequence that introduces her character as Bradley Cooper is transfixed. I imagine a lot of people heard the song for the first time.

Updating a playlist

Since reviving this blog earlier in the year, I’ve been building a playlist in Spotify of songs mentioned here on the blog.

You can sample the songs below: