If it became a trend I would curse it, but I would champion the first and most innovative few bands that combine the sexuality of Serge Gainsbourg's Historie de Melody Nelson with the menacing cool of a Badalamenti score. The first band to cross the threshold is Hey Mother Death.
Comprised of Laurence, a girl from Halifax, Nova Scotia and Denma a garçon from Paris, France, Hey Mother Death's "You Left Me" does not mince words, or intend to be taken lightly. It's a patient killer of a composition that whispers in your ear and rocks you into a sleep that could very well be your last. Americans find French to be one of the most tantalizing languages, a language of love. The title "You Left Me" combined with the Lynchian soundtrack places Hey Mother Death an unsettling atmosphere, in which the French language becomes the temptress and the wrath. It's in her tone and it's in the screeching grind of the violins. It's in the sublte sway of the bass. Without translating the lyrics, I have a bad feeling about the future of the man who left her.
Hey Mother Death's self-titled EP is sold out. Let's hope a re-press is in the works.
