Pedgerow wrote:This might seem like an odd approach to choosing music, but it has come to my attention over the past couple of years that I absolutely love music that is in foreign languages, almost without reservation. The pop music of other countries fascinates me. It might be because of my international upbringing, or maybe just because I don't usually listen to lyrics as closely as other people, but this thread isn't my blog so it doesn't matter. If you are from a country that doesn't speak English, what charts hits do you have that won't have been heard in other countries? In case this thread becomes enormously popular, please only provide songs that are not sung in English. If nobody posts in this thread (which is far more likely), then I guess you can consider it, but I'm still mainly interested in foreign-language pop music.
Hungarians and Ukrainians, if there are any! I particularly want to hear from you! See below!I will get the ball rolling with as many foreign song recommendations as I can think of:
==Germany==
German-language pop music was
fairly popular in the 1980s, with bands you've heard of like Nena (
99 Luftballons) and Falco (
Rock Me Amadeus). But because I am such an unbearable hipster, I have transcended such peasant music and would like to recommend other, less-famous songs by those same bands:
Nena - Irgendwie Irgendwo IrgendwannNena - Nur GeträumtFalco - Der Kommissar (so funky!)
Falco - Jeanny (dark and scary and all about murdering some woman; do not play this with the others at your barbecue)
Someone else can recommend Rammstein because I'm sure nobody here will be discovering them for the first time, but my favourite Rammstein song is
Spieluhr.
==France==
Again, I get the feelings French pop stars were more famous in the 1980s. You're going to need to really like '80s pop music to keep clicking these links:
Desireless - Voyage VoyageFrance Gall - Ella Elle L'aVanessa Paradis - Joe Le TaxiAlso, two different versions of Désenchantée:
the artsy original by Mylène Farmer, and
the more accessible generic dance-pop version that was #1 in Belgium for about three straight months.
French rap is legendary, so I'm sure you can help me out there.
MC Solaar - Paradisiaque seems to be a good example.
Manau - La Tribu de Dana was a colossal crossover hit in the late 1990s, with its sample of some wacky ancient Breton folk song. It's about as hip as Ariana Grande, but it's fantastic and none of this music is particularly cool anyway so you might as well give it a chance. And speaking of sampling Breton folk music, that's not in English either so here you go:
Alan Stivell - Tri MartolodAnd that's a great way to also recommend
Son Ar Christr, which has also been sampled by hundreds of other songs which people often get drunk to.
This one is in Dutch.
==Music in Dutch==
What a segue! I'm not actually saying this music is all from Holland, however, because
Gorki were Belgian and I really want to talk about them. They are hugely acclaimed in Belgium as one of history's greatest Dutch-language rock bands, but they are kind of like The Smiths are to English music: poetically emo lyrics, but they don't really rock that hard. I have therefore always wondered if their music would appeal to people who don't speak Dutch. If you're still reading, and you don't speak Dutch, please let me know what you think, because I'm genuinely curious:
Gorki - Soms Vraagt Een Mens Zich AfGorki - Joeri (a song all about Yuri Gagarin; I find this song fantastically and unbelievably depressing, and the video adds to that, although most people think I was just a teenager with a boner when it came out)
Gorki - Mia (this once topped a Belgian poll as the greatest song
of all time, beating out all the regular worldwide hits like Smells Like Teen Spirit and Imagine and Bohemian Rhapsody, so I really want to know how you feel about this one)
Gorki - Ik Reis Door de Nacht (this one rocks a little harder; my prediction is that this will be the only one that non-Dutch-speakers like)
Dutch-speakers actually seem to be pretty damn skilled when it comes to song lyrics;
Het Is Een Nacht by Guus Meeuwis feels very romantic to me. However, I have a theory that if you can understand something in a foreign language, it can bypass your cynicism and make you love it enormously when you otherwise wouldn't if it was in your own language. Again, I suspect you won't like it at all if you don't speak Dutch.
==Sweden==
Caramelldansen was a meme so you might know it, but maybe you didn't do what I did and look up loads of other songs by the same band. If you don't like bubblegum pop, skip these recommendations:
Caramell - Spelar Ingen Roll (such positive lyrics!)
Caramell - Explodera (look; you were warned)
Sweden is actually an incredibly fantastic country for music, but I'm just listing recommendations off the top of my head here, so I'll let you post the others.
==Now let me tell you about my favourite YouTube channel==
If you're still with me, my love of songs that aren't in English skyrocketed tremendously when I discovered the greatest YouTube channel in the universe:
https://www.youtube.com/user/ultradiskopanoramaIt's absolutely brimming with obscure pop music from far-off countries. Two of this phenomenal channel's best recommendations led me to be really passionate about the music of those countries specifically, but I'll start off with a few random songs from interesting places:
Ledi Disko - Tu Pasiimk Mano Širdį (euro disco, Lithuania 1996)Inuit - Upperisarsiungaaleramik (Greenland, 1980) (this is some legitimately obscure and cool prog rock; I feel like far more of a hipster poseur when I listen to this than I do with the rest of these links)Nil Burak - Ağladımmı Güldümmü (disco, Turkey 1980)Sevda Alpay & Zafer Dilek – Kara Kaşlı Yar (psych folk, Turkey 1974) (this, again, is legitimately cool and it makes me feel like I'm trying too hard to be awesome by associating myself with its radical brilliance)Vitalij Karyukov / Виталий Карюков – Тишина (synth disco, Russia 1993) (the channel is full of music like this; this one is good but not particularly memorable, and I post it mainly for completeness. You can skip it if you want)VIG Ilyuziya / ВИГ Илюзия - Кой Си Ти? / Koi Si Ti? (synth disco, Bulgaria 1985) (don't skip this one! It has saxophones!)==Ukraine==
Does anyone here have Ukrainian heritage? Or any connections at all to Ukraine? I want to speak to you so desperately! Was
Rusya famous in your country? Have you ever heard of her? She is one of the absolute totems of me liking music I can't understand, and I would not have made this record-shatteringly long post without my knowledge of her, discovered through the above YouTube channel. This all really started with me wondering what sort of music the Soviet Union listened to, and Rusya is so obscure that it feels like she is a pop star who exists only for me, and therefore I love her, however anyone else feels. I can't find much about her online, however, so she might be a total nobody over there. However, her sister is the Russian pop star
Natasha Koroleva, who seems to be much more famous. I know very little about her, though.
Rusya / Руся - Bud shcho bude / Будь що буде (italo disco, Ukraine USSR, 1990) (this is where it all began! My passion would be nothing without this song!)Rusya / Руся - Білий сніг / Bily Snig (italo synth disco, Ukraine USSR 1989)==Hungary==
Okay! Last country! I am a huge fan of [url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoton_Família]Neoton Familia[/url], and would like someone to talk to about them, please. Preferably someone who speaks English. They're one of the biggest bands in Hungarian history as far as I can tell, to the extent that cool music people in Hungary possibly hate them. But they're obscure over here, so not only is it not lame to like them, but I also really struggle to find anyone who has heard of them. They are generally regarded as "the Hungarian ABBA", and with some songs, it's obvious why:
Neoton Familia - 220 FelettHowever, they were around for decades, doing 1970s disco (
Hozzank Mindig Hazaerkezel), proper artistic merit music (
Párbeszéd), weird communist Hungarian reggae (
Születésnap), then they became a gigantic generic pop band to maximise profits for the collectivist socialist cause.
Hétvégi motorozásNyar VanTheir lead singer, Eva Csepregi, then went on to have an equally colossal solo career:
Kék korszak (I have probably listened to this song more than any other listed here)
Igy Vagy UgyI could post links all day. Also, for even greater financial success outside of their native Hungary, a lot of their songs are available with English translations. I won't post those now because I maintain that hopefully this thread will only be for songs that are not in English, but if you discover a song of theirs that you like, hit me up and I might know the English translated version. Be warned, though, that some are
absolutely comical and baffling.
There's also another cool Hungarian band called Napoleon Boulevard:
Júlia nem akar a földön járniAnd with that, I think I've posted enough links. I also suspect I'm starting to come across as slightly deranged. So, do you know any songs that you like that aren't in English? I am clearly not that discerning. Mexicans: what's Paulina Rubio's best song? I tried looking in case she was great, but I want to hear from someone who lives somewhere with exposure to her. Wherever you live, or even if you've just heard of a foreign band, please post links to them below!