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theboywiththecuckooclockheart · 3 years

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My Top 10 Favorite Songs From Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart: Concept Album and Movie

Here I will rank my top 10 favorite songs between the movie and concept album versions of Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart. I personally believe that the French concept album songs are quite different from the translations in the English movie, so I will rank them independently. That means that one song may end up on this list twice for the reasons I will explain as we go down the list. Let’s start from number 10:

10. “Mademoiselle Clé”

As simple and intimate as this scene in the movie is, I’m going to have to put the French version on this list. Mainly because it stays a bit more true to the scene in the novel which is much less PG than the movie. The French song shares the line “...she works her Blue Fairy magic on me, like in Pinocchio, but more real. Except it’s not my nose that’s growing longer.” The implications of that quote in the novel and the French song are obvious, but are much more loosely intimated in the film. Also, I simply prefer the composition of the French album song over the movie version.

You can find the French song from the concept album here on Dioysos’ official Youtube channel and the scene from the movie here on a fan’s Youtube channel.

9. “Tais-Toi Mon Coeur”

This song can only be found in the concept album and corresponds more directly to the plot of the book than the movie. The title means “Be Quiet my Heart” (or, more aggressively, “shut up, my heart”). It is such a catchy song and the old music video associated with it has a really cool animation style which some hoped would have been the style of the entire movie, but alas.

You can find the official song here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel and the music video here on a fan’s Youtube channel.

8. “Flamme A Lunettes”

There are actually three versions of the song “Flame with Glasses” because it also shows up in the book. The book version is quite short, and is actually the most similar to the movie for that reason. However, the song in the concept album encapsulates more of the action in the novel itself, not just the song that Miss Acacia sings. Additionally, the imagery in the song from the album is much richer and Jack and Miss Acacia’s banter goes on for a little longer. Even though the scene in the movie is visually intriguing and captures some of the imagery with its setting, I’m going to have to put the album version on this list.

You can find the French song from the concept album here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel and the scene from the English movie here on a fan’s Youtube channel.

7. “L'école De Joe”

“The School of Joe” can only be found in the movie in its instrumental form, so I don’t want to make a direct comparison to the lyric version in the album. However, I don’t think I have to. Both incarnations capture the same menacing energy and climactic build, and what the movie may lack in lyrics it sure makes up for in the scene. And while I hate to put Joe nearly halfway up my list, the song is just too powerful to put any lower.

You can find the French song from the concept album here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel.

6. “Malagueña”

Doing the research on the Spanish songs in the album and the movie sure gave me a run for my money because I had no idea about the multilingual talents of Olivia Ruiz. She both voices and sings Miss Acacia in the French movie, the concept album (which is in French, of course), as well as the Spanish songs in both (if not all) of the translations of the movie. Her version of “La Malagueña”, a traditional Mexican Huapango song, was originally covered on two of her albums [1], and is of course identical in the concept album and the movie because there is no need to translate it. It was tough for me to choose between “Malagueña” and “Quijote”, but for the wonderful and fantastical elements surrounding it in the movie and for the great references to quotes from the novel during the scene, “Malagueña” makes it on this list.

You can find the song from the concept album here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel and an amazing live performance of it by Olivia Ruiz here.

5. “Le Jour Le Plus Froid du Monde”

Thanks to this Youtube video and the fanart included in it, “The Coldest Day on Earth” was the first song I ever heard from the “La Mécanique Du Cœur” concept album and was how I discovered the movie in the first place. I have always been an enthusiast for anything vaguely steampunk, and a rhythm set by cuckoo-clocks is exactly the kind of song I’m looking for. Once I figured out what the French lyrics actually mean, I knew I needed to find out more about this weird world. It took me exactly two years to get my hands on a copy of the book after watching the movie, and I discovered the entire concept album around that time as well. Perhaps this song should be number one on this list because it is literally the reason I have this blog to begin with, but I just can’t deny how much I love the other songs at the top of this list.

I also can’t fail to mention the sort of reprised version of the song, called “Le Réveil Des Coucous Vivants”, or “The Awakening of the Living Cuckoos” which makes an appearance very early in the movie, but is actually the last song on the concept album. If you want to experience an amazing example of how cuckoos can be used as incredibly haunting musical instruments, I recommend you check it out.

You can find the French song from the concept album here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel here is the link to “Le Réveil Des Coucous Vivants” on their channel as well.

4. “La Panique Mécanique”

I absolutely love how much this song builds and how it captures the experience of traveling on a train alone for the first time. This song does make a shortened appearance in the movie during Jack’s train ride, but I’m not a huge fan of how they altered the lyrics. Another thing that makes the French album version so much more striking than the English movie version is Alain Bashung’s [2] performance of Jack the Ripper’s lines. His voice is so mysterious and menacing and creates the perfect bridge into the chaotic latter portion of the song. Perhaps it is my relative lack of exposure to a variety of French voices, but his rendition just hits different than the English one in my opinion.

You can find the French version from the concept album here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel. Unfortunately I can’t find a good link to the scene in the movie, so you will have to do some digging yourself if you are interested.

3. “Jack Et La Mécanique Du Cœur”

In third place is the French concept album version of the titular song “Jack Et La Mécanique Du Cœur”. It is the very first song on the concept album and serves as a sort of summary for the plot and kind of resembles a Greek chorus [3] that speculates what our protagonist Jack is going to do. It includes some interjection from Georges Méliès and ends with him saying “Et maintenant, bon film” (”And now, enjoy the film”), which I find very cute since it’s sort of like we are watching Méliès’ own film adaption of the story, which he tells Jack during the movie that he could very well make.

You can find the French concept album version here on Dionysos’ official Youtube channel.

2. “Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart” (English version from the end credits of the movie)

Maybe this is a cop-out, but I just couldn’t decide which version of this song to put on this list, so I included both. After much deliberation, I decided to put the English version at number two instead of three. It seems sacrilegious somehow, but I just had to put it a little higher for a couple of reasons. One, I discovered it first so it lodged itself in my consciousness before the French version did, and two, I just can’t get over Orlando Seale’s voice in this song. Of course Mathias Malzieu is completely unparalleled, but there is something about Seale’s optimistic and gallant tone that is completely enrapturing.

It’s sort of a bummer that this amazing song only shows up at the very end of the credits, but I must admit it is a difficult song to place anywhere else in the film considering the inexplicable presence of Méliès (which makes it hard to put at the beginning for the sake of the plot). But, it also doesn’t make sense at the end since it’s a summary of what we just watched and the final line tells us to “enjoy the film” as the last few credits roll up on the screen. Regardless, I should be happy that the song was ever translated into English because I can thank it for keeping my interest and passion for the story alive.

You can find the English version here on a fan’s Youtube channel.

1. “L’Homme Sans Trucage”

And finally, number one. You’d think “Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart” would have taken this spot considering how much I went on about it, but “L’Homme Sans Trucage” (”The Man Without Special Effects”) from the concept album has an absolutely tangible feeling of adventure and boundlessness with instrumentals that are out of this world. Who else but Dionysos can mix record-scratching, keyboard, banjo, drums, and more simultaneously and make it sound that amazing? The song perfectly captures the “coming of age” theme of the story, and the imagery in the song is beyond inspiring.

I also need to mention the reference in the title and in the chorus to Méliès’ diary in the story which he titled “The Man without Special Effects” (or “The Man Who Was No Hoax” per the English translation of the novel). That diary in both the movie and the novel is Méliès’ retelling of his time spent with Jack (which is why I think putting the song “Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart” in the beginning of the movie would be so cool) and is emphasized a bit more in the novel than in the movie. That diary makes a sort of legend out of Jack, and its title implies entirely different layers of meaning between the movie and the novel.

To give the movie some credit, though, the scene is a lot of fun, and I love how they styled it à la Méliès with paper cutouts and the reference to “The Impossible Voyage” [4] by the real Georges Méliès. The scene stays true to the surrealism of the story, and is definitely quite enjoyable. But, in the end, I have to give “L’Homme Sans Trucage” the number one spot on my list.

You can find the French version from the concept album here on Dionysos official Youtube channel and the scene from the movie here on Shout! Factory’s Youtube channel.

There are 31 tracks (including interludes) on the complete “La Mécanique Du Cœur” concept album, so of course I couldn’t include them all here. The styles and tones of each song are so unique, and I think the entire album is worth a listen. I first listened to the entire album roughly concurrently with the plot of the novel, and that was a pretty great way to experience it, in my opinion. But, if you’re like me and you aren’t exactly fluent in French, it’s not like you’ll get many spoilers from the songs.

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All quotes are from the film and/or novel “Jack and Cuckoo-Clock Heart” by Mathias Malzieu unless otherwise specified.

Sources and additional information:

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malague%C3%B1a_Salerosa

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alain_Bashung

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_chorus#:~:text=A%20Greek%20chorus%2C%20or%20simply,voice%20on%20the%20dramatic%20action.

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Impossible_Voyage

#jack and the cuckoo-clock heart #jack et la mécanique du coeur #mathias malzieu #olivia ruiz #malaguena salerosa #georges melies #orlando seale #the impossible voyage

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