MINK DEVILLE Le Chat Bleu

MINK DEVILLE Le chat bleu 1981/2003 Raven 320 kbps

This must be the night / Savoir faire / That world outside / Slow drain / You just keep holding on / Lipstick traces / Bad boy /Mazurka / Just to walk that litte girl home / Heaven stood still / Turn you every way but loose .

Bonus tracks : Le chat bleu performances (live) : Savoir faire / Slow drain / This must be the night / Bad boy / Lipstick traces / Just to walk that little girl home / Heaven stood still / sAVE the last dance for me . + Willy DeVille & Doc Pomus interview.

Produced by Steve Douglas & Willy DeVille .

Willy DeVille : vocals, guitar / Louis X. Erlanger : lead guitar / Kenny Margolis : keyboards & accordian / Jerry Scheff : bass / Ron Tutt :drums / Steve Douglas : saxophone / String arrangements : J. C. Petit / Background vocals : Jake of the Family Jewels , Eve Moon , K. Margolis .

Although a product of the New York punk scene, at heart Mink DeVille was a soul band with roots in R&B, the blues and even Cajun music. The group was a showcase for frontman Willy DeVille (born William Boray in 1953), a native New Yorker who in 1971 travelled to London to form a band; unable to find compatible musicians, he worked as a solo performer before returning to the U.S. and settling in San Francisco, where he founded the first incarnation of Mink DeVille in 1974 with bassist Ruben Siguenza and drummer Tom "Manfred" Allen .

After playing in Bay Area leather bars and lounges under a variety of names including Billy DeSade & the Marquis and the Lazy Eights, the trio read a music magazine feature spotlighting the Ramones; duly inspired, Mink DeVille relocated to New York, where they recruited guitarist Louie X. Erlanger. After debuting with three tracks on the Live at CBGB' compilation, the band entered the studio with legendary producer Jack Nitzsche and surfaced in 1977 with "Cabretta", an energetic, soulful outing highlighted by "Spanish Stroll," a Top 20 hit in the U.K.

After the critical acclaim of their self-titled debut and "Return to Magenta" in 1977 and 1978, respectively, Willy DeVille and his band took another look at the sassy, street-tough rock & roll they'd dished up and took the first step toward the swinging Spanish soul the band's subsequent albums would strive for and the crooning R&B heartbreaker DeVille himself would become as a solo artist. Le Chat Bleu is angel-headed hipster rock. The Doc Pomus influence on the opening track, "This Must Be the Night," with its cascading harmonies and 1950s girl group melodies, is a doo wop fantasy for the punk age. That influence was more than that as Pomus and Willy DeVille co-wrote three songs together for this stellar effort. Far more reverent than the Ramones and nowhere near Robert Gordon's stilted revivalism, Mink DeVille could sing and play rock & roll sweetly and razor sharp, kind of like a lollipop on the edge of a dagger. The first of the DeVille/Pomus soul ballads is included here. "That World Outside," with producer Steve Douglas' lilting tenor saxophone that twists itself around each line and breezes through the chorus, is pure Doc Pomus, with DeVille carrying a vocal he'd never attempted before. This was the beginning of something for the band, and the end of something else. Piss and vinegar were not enough to fuel the band's muse any longer — it also took polish, sensitivity, and a deep commitment to subtlety and drama, and this ballad contains them in spades. The other two, "You Just Keep Holdin' On" and "Just to Walk That Little Girl Home," burn as brightly. Of the rockers, "Savoir Faire" and "Lipstick Traces" contain the wooly garage stomp of the earlier records and keep their switchblade honesty and punky edge. Contrary to popular belief, this album is not the sound of a band losing its innocence as much as it is the sound of a rock & roll band finding its identity.