Samedi Soir Sur La Terre [Import]

Francis Cabrel | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (March 29, 1994)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Columbia France
• ASIN: B000025RVQ
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (48 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #56,851 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

The French pop/folk singer/songwriter's 1994 studio album packaged in a digibook. Ten tracks. Sony.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good for ANY night on earth, February 25, 2001

By 

Volkswagen Blues "cead1" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Samedi Soir Sur La Terre (Audio CD)

Some long-time Cabrel fans feel like he's sold out, and they usually point to this album in particular; without the major social- and poltical-issue efforts of earlier albums, "Samedi soir sur la terre" marks a continuation of the artistic journey Cabrel seems to have started with "Sarbacane," a movement inwards. Almost as if deciding that you can't sort the world out until you sort yourself out, "Samedi soir" avoids heavier political themes in favor of moments of introspection, occasional whimsy, and compassionate observation.

It's easy to call something a sell-out when it's this easy to listen to, when it's just this good. Me, I like Cabrel's profiling of social injustices on earlier albums--songs about immigrants struggling for acceptance and comfort, or about wounded and increasingly uncertain corners of former certainty in French culture. But I think it's just as important for an artist with that kind of gift for trenchant insight to set his sights on the bricks that make up society and political formations: individual human lives and how they come into contact with other individual human lives. In this way, I think, Cabrel's songs on "Samedi soir"--about precarious relationships, about love for one's children, and about the way the big bad world seems to play with us--are every bit as vital as songs that seem to boast a more immediate political agenda.

Buy this album; in addition to the intimacy of the lyrics and the accessibility of the music and the Gypsy King cameo and the beautifully clean production (as if all of that weren't reason enough), it's just plain pretty.

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Rock Solid French Artist With Beautiful Music, March 7, 2000

By 

N. Hatch (Bellingham, WA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Samedi Soir Sur LA Terre (Audio CD)

I think I first heard "Je T'Aimais, Je T'Aime, Je T'Aimerai" at my French Teacher's wedding... But I'm not sure. I remember running across this song on Napster one day, while searching for something else. I loved it, and borrowed the CD for the weekend. Francis Cabrel sings songs that are both beautiful and well written. (It makes me wonder what else us stereotypical non-importing Americans miss.) It was so good that I decided to buy the CD, even thought I could have downloaded most of it.

I'm a beginning French student, and it's amazing how much I can pick up. I'll just get parts of songs stuck in my head, go around singing them all day, then smack myself in the forehead when I realize what I've been singing. It just clicks, which is a great feeling. The lyrics are easily understandable, he doesn't mumble or slur. This CD should be bought by anybody who likes artists similar in sound to Eric Clapton, or anybody interested in French.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Escaping from French Neil Diamond Syndrome, June 13, 2004

By 

T. Wright "frazzle" (Milwaukee, WI United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Samedi Soir Sur La Terre (Audio CD)

Cabrel's earlier albums carry a definite Neil Diamond-esque feel to them. This album manages to cast this aside (as much as is possible) and acheives a very mature yet fresh and energetic feel to it. Nearly completely acoustic, it has a great folksy feel. I love all but maybe one or two songs on this album (and even those "disliked" songs would make me pause on the radio dial if I heard them). Cabrel makes perfect use of the 4 minute mileu to make his points or tell his stories, which generally manage to be both specific and generally applicable stories, hence making them resonate beyond the bounds of the words themselves. Lastly, Cabrel is great for learners of French as he sings clearly and is relatively easy to understand, yet sounds as French as French can be.