Category: Culture

Discover the melancholy folk of “The Wooden Wolf”

Led by the melancholy voice of Alex Keiling, the Alsatian band “The Wooden Wolf” released a 6th album last November. “Winter Variations” takes you into a folk and melancholic mood. An ode to open spaces and introspection.

“My music, I want it poetic and profound” explains the singer and composer of “The Wooden Wolf” Alex Keiling. Meeting in Strasbourg on the occasion of the group’s 6th album,  “Winter Variations”  (Deaf Rock Records)

Source CULTUREBOX: Discover the melancholy folk of “The Wooden Wolf”

The Travails of Emmanuel Macron

Macron

A new book equates the French president’s rise to a revolution. For much of France’s working and middle classes, it has been nothing short of a disaster.

Last September, French President Emmanuel Macron met an unassuming gardener on the grounds of the Élysée Palace. Introducing himself, the 25-year-old timidly explained that he was having trouble finding work. “I send résumés and cover letters… they don’t lead to anything,” he told the president. Many people in France can relate: The country’s unemployment rate hovers just below 9 percent, more than two points above the European Union average. The joblessness rate, meanwhile, is more than twice that for young people age 15 to 24.

Macron’s reaction, however, was less than sympathetic—almost as if he were hearing this problem for the very first time and wasn’t all that convinced of its seriousness. “If you’re willing and motivated, in hotels, cafés, and restaurants, construction, there’s not a single place I go where they don’t say they’re looking for people!” he exclaimed. Then he added, “If I crossed the street, I’d find you one.” Continue reading “The Travails of Emmanuel Macron” →

‘Quoi, just two glasses?’ French urged to cut down on their drinking

vin

France on Monday launched a national campaign to encourage the wine-loving French to cut down on their drinking after a study showed that a quarter of them over-consume. But many still feel that “a nice meal can’t be enjoyed without a good wine”.

France has one of the highest alcohol consumption rates in Europe, with the country trailing behind only Estonia, Lithuania and the Czech Republic in the quantities of alcohol it drinks, according to the World Health Organization. This drinking culture – largely attributed to wine, which represents 58 percentof France’s total alcohol consumption – on Monday prompted the public health agency and the National Institute of Cancer (INCa) to launch a national campaign, with recommendations for the maximum daily intake of alcohol.

I’ve never seen, to my knowledge – unfortunately, perhaps – a youngster leaving a nightclub drunk because they drank Côtes-du-Rhône, Crozes-Hermitage or Costières-de-Nîmes.

“For your health, alcohol should be limited to a maximum of two glasses per day, and not every day either,” they wrote, a limit that 24 percent of French adults regularly surpass. Alcohol is the second-biggest cause for preventable deaths in France after tobacco, killing some 41,000 people each year.

Forty-year-old Caroline from Paris, who did not want to give her real name, said that she grew up “literally swimming in wine”.

“In my family, our meals together have always been extremely important, and there has always been wine on the table.” Continue reading “‘Quoi, just two glasses?’ French urged to cut down on their drinking” →

Charlotte Gainsbourg Will Tour The U.S. This April

The French singer brings her tour through the United States in April.

Charlotte Gainsbourg is on the road again. The Franco-British singer and actress will be on tour in the United States in April of this year. She will stop in Boston (April 7), Washington (April 8), Brooklyn (April 9), and San Francisco (April 15) and before heading to Coachella in Indio, California.

The star, who made her musical debut at the age of 12, will promote her latest album “Rest,” in which she recalls the death of her father, the famous Serge Gainsbourg, and her half-sister, Kate Barry. It was released in November 2017. The album is produced by the French DJ Sebastian Akchoté, alias “SebastiAn”, who has collaborated with Frank Ocean and Fall Out Boy. He also worked on Gainsbourg’s EP, “Take 2”, released in December.

Source: Charlotte Gainsbourg Will Tour The U.S. This April