309 - [Gainsbourg, Bardot, and the Hippies]

[Gainsbourg, Bardot, and the Hippies] GAINSBOURG (Serge). La Bise aux Hippies. [1967]. Autograph working manuscript and typescript signed “gainsbourg,” with 2 lines of musical notation, handwritten staging notes (“Sacha kisses Brigitte / Brigitte kisses me along with Sacha and me / I kiss Sacha") and performance notes ("cythar intro" / "music to be reworked" / "song 25"), cross-outs and corrections (the original working title “Hippies’ Rock” was corrected to the final title “La Bise aux Hippies”). 1 folio in-4 manuscript on the recto. (Minor creases and marginal wear.) A very beautiful autograph manuscript and signed typescript, particularly vivid in its visual style, of this song written for Brigitte Bardot during an intense artistic and personal period in Serge Gainsbourg’s life. "I don't like tanks / I don't like banks / I don't like taking risks / I don't like fights / I don't like getting hit / I don’t like idiots / but I like giving a kiss / a kiss to the Hippies / I don’t like detention / I don’t like school / I don’t like the high school diploma / I don’t like college / I don’t like the mine / I don’t like factories / but I like giving kisses / kisses to the hippies / I don’t like veal / I don’t like Hugo / I don’t like tripe / I don’t like Oedipus[sic] / but I like giving kisses / a kiss to the hippies” followed by “repeat first stanza”—typed and crossed out—then two rhymes added as a handwritten note: “I don’t like checks / I don’t like Czechs”. The refrain concluding each pair (“but I like to kiss […]”) is handwritten here in each stanza, replacing a previous typewritten version. "The song [created by Sacha Distel and Brigitte Bardot on television], which has the working title *Hippies’ Rock*, was written specifically for the *Sacha Show* on November 1, 1967. The performers, Sacha Distel and Brigitte Bardot, are dressed as quintessential hippies in floral shirts and necklaces in a lip-synced performance where Serge Gainsbourg makes a cameo appearance playing electric guitar. The song is actually built around a melody played on an Indian sitar, in the purest psychedelic style of the era. The scene was rebroadcast on the “Brigitte Bardot” Show on January 1, 1968, and the recording was released under the title “Hippies” on the American compilation *Spécial Bardot* (Burlington Cameo BC-100), published in late 1968." G. Verlant & L. Picaud, *L’Intégrale Gainsbourg: The Story of All His Songs*, Fetjaine, 2011. In the late 1960s, Gainsbourg gradually moved away from his jazz-pop style to immerse himself in pop music. This transition was particularly evident in a brief foray into psychedelia, which began with “Teenie Weenie Boppie” for France Gall. In “La Bise aux Hippies,” he embraced all the conventions of the genre and—unusually for him—incorporated the sitar, an iconic instrument of the era. He would use it again shortly thereafter with Serge Colombier for the sublime soundtrack to Jean Aurel’s film “Manon 70” (starring Catherine Deneuve and Sami Frey), notably in the track “New Delire,” recorded in January 1968. “La Bise aux Hippies” was released in late 1967, while Gainsbourg was experiencing a brief yet intense romance with “Brigitte Bardot.” For his muse, who was still married to Günther Sachs, he composed several iconic tracks: “Harley Davidson,” “Bonnie and Clyde,” and the scandalous “Je t’aime… moi non plus,” which he would not be able to release until 1986, after reinterpreting it with Jane Birkin, his new partner and wife. Gainsbourg finally dedicated the title track of his new album, the superb “Initials B.B.” (1968), to Bardot. The lyrics in the manuscript, though different from the final version while retaining its structure, reveal Gainsbourg’s penchant for “echoing rhymes” and “wordplay,” both characteristic of this period of artistic transition and indicative of the time just preceding the May 1968 protests.