IRM- Charlotte Gainsbourg ("Whispered Words")

Listening to the new Charlotte Gainsbourg album is like stepping in from the late winter weather to the peacefulness of a warm bath. Under the guiding hand of one Mr. Beck Hansen, a woman with not much musical genius in her own right transforms into something otherworldly.

A voice, whispery and all-knowing, enraptures the listener's full attention, while genres are crossed in a way much remiscent of her late father (the musical genius, Serge Gainsbourg, who famously romanced her mother, Jane Birkin, and created a song that was banned by the Vatican).

Do not let her get stuck in her father's controversial shadow, though. That would be a colossal tragedy on your part. Gainsbourg has gone to establish herself in both acting (she starred in, most recently, the gory "Antichrist" by Lars Von Trier) and musically-speaking, "IRM" (the French abbreviation for "MRI") is her own project. Well, her's and Beck's, anyway.

The record itself was triggered by a catastrophic event in Gainsbourg's personal life in the past few years. She suffered an aneurysm while filming "I'm Not There," which almost cost her life in the summer of 2007.
She was able to undergo emergency surgery and obviously survived, but the incident left its mark on her. And understandably.

"The doctors kept telling me I was fine but I had some instinct that I wasn't. It was a kind of post-traumatic anxiety, constantly feeling very vulnerable and thinking I was going to die at any minute," she explained to British news source The Guardian.

Gainsbourg developed a health-obsession, undergoing a series of MRIs to make sure her body was back to normal. She eventually abandoned this habit, but the sounds of MRI machines play an interesting role on "IRM," especially on the title track.

And Gainsbourg's collaboration with Beck couldn't have worked any better. It was a dream of both following a meeting at a White Stripes concert. Beck himself was inspired by the work of her father—the song "Paper Tiger" off of "Sea Change" samples one of Serge Gainsbourg's.

Beck provided the material and helped with the process; she transformed it into something of mastery. She gave it life.

Considering Beck wrote the majority of the material previous to their recording of the album, the coincidences of the subject matter and Gainsbourg's personal struggle are mind-blowing. It's a collaboration that has to have been fated.

Almost every track on "IRM" works, despite what genres the two unlikely musical soulmates toy in. "Trick Pony" is a bluesy track that wouldn't be out of place in the Kills catalog; "Me and Jane Doe" has a distinct Beck quality to it. And the French language tracks flow with a quality that brings to mind Birkin at her sexiest.

The standout, however, is the dreamy "Time of the Assassins," which sounds a lot like the material from Gainsbourg's "5:55," on which she worked with Pulp's Jarvis Cocker and the French duo Air.

It works as a good transition between the two (Gainsbourg's other album was "Lemon Incest," which she released as a pre-teenager with her father's help; a sample lyric from that other album's title track: "the love that we will never make together...")

Yup. I will not dwell on that one. There are flaws, like Gainsbourg's sometimes weak, whispery voice. Which also is the source of such great beauty. And "In the End" does feel a tad overdramatic, although repeated plays make it bearable.

Overall, it's encouraging to see an apt work of two united artists sprung from personal tragedy. Take hope in that. If Charlotte can get through "drill my brain full of holes," then you can get through anything. And make a pretty amazing album while you're at it.

MARCH 19 2010