Brad Spurgeon's Blog

It turned out to be a short and quick night last night, in three or four parts. First was a visit to the Sans Souci bar in Pigalle to listen to part of the DJ session of Patrick Eudeline, a central figure in the French music scene for the past more than three decades.

The Sans Souci is a neat little bar and restaurant just off the place Pigalle and around the corner from the Bus Palladium. It is always crowded, always has people bursting out into the streets. And last night Eudeline played mostly 60s stuff, and I laughed when I heard “da doo ron ron ron de do ron ron…” as I had been singing it lately around the house, my son had been listening to it separately, and I THINK I might have read something about it in a column by Eudeline in Rock & Folk, where he is a regular contributor. But I may have read that elsewhere. (The story had talked about how the expression and sound of the song encapsulated teenage joy and abandon….)

Eudeline started out writing at another popular rock magazine in the 70s called, “Best.” He’s a bit of a French gonzo journalist, but many other things too. In the mid-70s he moved on to playing in a rock band called “Asphalt Jungle,” which was a precursor group to the punk movement in France, and then he wrote for Rock & Folk. He has also written novels. So a real renaissance man. In fact, as a young man he had met William S. Burroughs and through him met some of the French literati in Morocco, and ended up at 22 writing for a literary review called, Tel Quel. Yes, an interesting man.

I went over to say hello to him and no sooner did I say hello and shake his hand than the music ceased. I think the hard disc came unplugged from the computer, the crowd booed, and he quickly got the sound back in – within about 15 seconds. I stayed for a bit of the music and a beer and then decided to walk onwards to my usual Thursday night blues jam session at the Cabaret Culture Rapide. I made a brief stopover at a restaurant near Stalingrad for a brief discussion with an insane woman I know, and then I moved on to the Cabaret Culture Rapide and immediately had to explain my black eye. “That’s Rock ‘N Roll,” said one of the band members, finally. I had one beer and decided to leave without performing. Went to the Mecano bar and had another beer, then returned home. A brief, yet full, little walk around Paris and through history. It was crap weather anyway….