Mustaches represent a phase in rock history that we pretend wasn’t there, but in fact, everyone was sporting them and knew none the wiser. ZZ Top, running around like a pair of Cousin It‘s, Freddy Mercury‘s almost political over-the-lip fluff, and a slew of men who fashioned their ‘staches to resemble such things as walruses, pencils and the curiously daring “Fu Manchu with an inverted toothbrush” posed proudly during photo ops to show off their mustaches in all their glory.
Today, men from this era still sport them, like my dad, who wears a Little Richard–esque one. (It occurs to me now that many Bollywood actors have paraded around in this same look.) I just learned that mustaches can even protect you from harmful radiation, so maybe they will make a comeback with my health-conscious generation.
Jean Ferrat was not only a man who was unrecognizable without his moustache but also belted out a few records. His music reconciled these two facts, given that each album was a canvas on which Ferrat could display his ever-increasingly unwieldy mustache to the millions of women who bought them. Yes, as I listened to six of these vinyl records back-to-back, I knew that I was entering dames territory, or today’s equivalent of places where Robbie Williams or John Mayer rules.
There were a slew of records that I didn’t like. On La Montagne (Barclay Records, 1964), it seemed like Ferrat had picked up a mic at a supper club and decided to be the evening’s entertainment. William Shatner was brought to mind when during “Autant d’amours autant de fleurs” (“As Many loves as There are Flowers”), Ferrat relentlessy repeated, “La jeunesse, la jeunesse” (“Youth, youth”), ad hominem. His interpretation of gypsy culture and music on La Commune (Barclay Records, 1971) left me in critical need of listening to Beirut’s much more evolved work to repair my ears. It sounded like a book report that the record execs made him do in order for him to sound more worldly (which made me think that Lavillier had the same idea when he concocted what became O, Gringo!). When I got to Ferrat’s ambitious project to set Louis Aragon‘s poetry to music, on Ferrat chante Aragon (Barclay Records, 1971), something told me I should straighten my glasses on my nose and get into student mode. After a track or two, I felt like I was in a poetry lecture. I much more preferred NU‘s “Reading and Writing Poetry” to sitting through “Ferrat Singing Aragon”.
Although both La femme est l’avenir de l’homme (Barclay Records, 1975) and Premières chansons: Eh L’amour! Le p’tit jardin (Disques Temey, 1976) made me want to take Ferrat by his shoulders and demand that he get his voice out of my head, Maria (Barclay Records, 1966) was … palatable. Stringed basses accompanied the arrangements, and I really thought I could dance to “En groupe, en ligne, en procession”.
My theory is this. There is a linear relationship between the size of his mustache and his album’s release dates. The earlier the record was released, the smaller the mustache, and the later the record came out, the more sweeping its side tails became. I believe that it was in 1966 when Ferrat and his moustache hit a sweet spot. Well, his mustache had even not begun to be.
Verdict: Keep (the one from 1966).