Biography
Charlotte Gainsbourg channels the same bold creativity and candid vulnerability from her screen performances into her songwriting and recordings. Her first effort, the 1986 album Charlotte for Ever, captured early signs of the fragile voice and boundary-pushing spirit she would develop more fully on subsequent releases, after working on the project with her father Serge while still in her teens. The 2006 album 5:55 established her distinctive identity as both creator and performer through its poised blend of electronic textures, orchestral arrangements, and rock elements paired with theatrical lyrics that honored her musical lineage; three years later, IRM expanded her palette to encompass psych-rock and dance-pop alongside a deeper autobiographical focus. That introspective approach culminated on the 2017 album Rest, whose tracks balanced sorrow and celebration while confronting the process of moving forward after profound loss. Across her career she has joined forces with esteemed figures such as members of Air and Daft Punk, Beck, and Paul McCartney, and her 2022 project Lovotic with Soundwalk Collective—an album exploring futuristic, sensual themes—extended the innovative spirit evident throughout her body of work.
Born to British actress Jane Birkin and French songwriter Serge Gainsbourg, she launched her professional singing career at roughly the same moment she entered acting. The 1984 duet “Lemon Incest” with her father reached number two on the French charts, earned gold certification in France, and later appeared on his 1985 album Love on the Beat as well as her own debut, December 1986’s Charlotte for Ever, which drew inspiration from the film he directed and in which both starred. The single’s provocative tone echoed the sexually precocious characters she portrayed in early films such as 1986’s L’Effrontée, for which she received a César for Most Promising Young Actress, 1988’s La Petite Voleuse, and 1991’s Merci la Vie. Throughout the 1990s she concentrated primarily on acting, taking roles in projects ranging from Franco Zeffirelli’s 1996 adaptation of Jane Eyre to 1999’s La Bûche, which brought her a César for Best Supporting Actress.
Gainsbourg reentered music in the 2000s, supplying the spoken-word opening to Madonna’s “What It Feels Like for a Girl” in 2001 and adding backing vocals to Badly Drawn Boy’s 2002 album Have You Fed the Fish? While filming Michel Gondry’s 2006 feature The Science of Sleep she began preparations for her second solo album. For this first collection of new songs in two decades she enlisted Air’s Jean-Benoît Dunckel and Nicolas Godin as composers, Jarvis Cocker and the Divine Comedy’s Neil Hannon as lyricists, and Nigel Godrich as producer. Released in August 2006, the refined 5:55 merged electronic and orchestral pop elements, reached the top of the French album chart, achieved platinum status in France, and featured the single “The Songs That We Sing,” which climbed to number 30 on the French singles chart. The album also registered internationally, peaking at number 196 on the Billboard 200 Albums chart in the United States after its April 2007 release.
Even while taking a part in Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There, Gainsbourg moved swiftly back into the studio, this time collaborating with Beck to refine her electronic pop material. Informed by the medical incident that followed a water-skiing accident, IRM arrived in Europe in December 2009—the same year the Lars von Trier-directed film Antichrist, starring Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe, debuted at Cannes. The album entered the French Top Five, later attained diamond certification across Europe, and reached number 69 in the United States upon its January 2010 release; the live EP Sunset Sound followed that April. December 2011 brought the double album Stage Whisper, which contained seven previously unreleased studio tracks from the IRM sessions—including work with Conor O’Brien of Villagers, Noah and the Whale, and Connan Mockasin—alongside eleven live performances captured during her 2010 European tour. The album earned double-silver certification in Europe the next year.
Gainsbourg devoted several subsequent years to film, appearing in 2012’s Confession of a Child of the Century alongside Pete Doherty and in von Trier’s 2013 Nymphomaniac, a role that earned Bodil Award and European Film Award nominations for Best Actress and featured her rendition of “Hey Joe.” Additional nominations for the Lumières Award for Best Actress arrived for her performances in 2014’s Samba and Three Hearts. She resumed recording with Rest, an album of French-language songs addressing the deaths of her father and half-sister Kate Barry, along with childhood anxieties, shyness, and other personal struggles. Issued in November 2017, the record featured contributions from Daft Punk’s Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, Paul McCartney, Owen Pallett, Connan Mockasin, and SebastiAn. Rest reached the French Top 20 and secured Gainsbourg the Female Artist of the Year Award at the 2018 Victoires de la Musique; she also received César and Lumières Award nominations for Best Actress for her work in Promise at Dawn. Further screen projects from this period encompassed Gaspar Noé’s 2019 feature Lux Æterna, 2020’s Suzanna Andler, and the 2021 film Jane by Charlotte, a documentary exploration of her relationship with her mother that she directed. In March 2022 she joined Soundwalk Collective on Lovotic, a release examining potential emotional and sexual connections between humans and robots that also included Atom™, Lyra Pramuk, and her Antichrist co-star Dafoe; the project appeared on the collective’s Analogue Foundation label and followed their earlier 2020 collaboration The Time of Night.
Born to British actress Jane Birkin and French songwriter Serge Gainsbourg, she launched her professional singing career at roughly the same moment she entered acting. The 1984 duet “Lemon Incest” with her father reached number two on the French charts, earned gold certification in France, and later appeared on his 1985 album Love on the Beat as well as her own debut, December 1986’s Charlotte for Ever, which drew inspiration from the film he directed and in which both starred. The single’s provocative tone echoed the sexually precocious characters she portrayed in early films such as 1986’s L’Effrontée, for which she received a César for Most Promising Young Actress, 1988’s La Petite Voleuse, and 1991’s Merci la Vie. Throughout the 1990s she concentrated primarily on acting, taking roles in projects ranging from Franco Zeffirelli’s 1996 adaptation of Jane Eyre to 1999’s La Bûche, which brought her a César for Best Supporting Actress.
Gainsbourg reentered music in the 2000s, supplying the spoken-word opening to Madonna’s “What It Feels Like for a Girl” in 2001 and adding backing vocals to Badly Drawn Boy’s 2002 album Have You Fed the Fish? While filming Michel Gondry’s 2006 feature The Science of Sleep she began preparations for her second solo album. For this first collection of new songs in two decades she enlisted Air’s Jean-Benoît Dunckel and Nicolas Godin as composers, Jarvis Cocker and the Divine Comedy’s Neil Hannon as lyricists, and Nigel Godrich as producer. Released in August 2006, the refined 5:55 merged electronic and orchestral pop elements, reached the top of the French album chart, achieved platinum status in France, and featured the single “The Songs That We Sing,” which climbed to number 30 on the French singles chart. The album also registered internationally, peaking at number 196 on the Billboard 200 Albums chart in the United States after its April 2007 release.
Even while taking a part in Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan biopic I’m Not There, Gainsbourg moved swiftly back into the studio, this time collaborating with Beck to refine her electronic pop material. Informed by the medical incident that followed a water-skiing accident, IRM arrived in Europe in December 2009—the same year the Lars von Trier-directed film Antichrist, starring Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe, debuted at Cannes. The album entered the French Top Five, later attained diamond certification across Europe, and reached number 69 in the United States upon its January 2010 release; the live EP Sunset Sound followed that April. December 2011 brought the double album Stage Whisper, which contained seven previously unreleased studio tracks from the IRM sessions—including work with Conor O’Brien of Villagers, Noah and the Whale, and Connan Mockasin—alongside eleven live performances captured during her 2010 European tour. The album earned double-silver certification in Europe the next year.
Gainsbourg devoted several subsequent years to film, appearing in 2012’s Confession of a Child of the Century alongside Pete Doherty and in von Trier’s 2013 Nymphomaniac, a role that earned Bodil Award and European Film Award nominations for Best Actress and featured her rendition of “Hey Joe.” Additional nominations for the Lumières Award for Best Actress arrived for her performances in 2014’s Samba and Three Hearts. She resumed recording with Rest, an album of French-language songs addressing the deaths of her father and half-sister Kate Barry, along with childhood anxieties, shyness, and other personal struggles. Issued in November 2017, the record featured contributions from Daft Punk’s Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, Paul McCartney, Owen Pallett, Connan Mockasin, and SebastiAn. Rest reached the French Top 20 and secured Gainsbourg the Female Artist of the Year Award at the 2018 Victoires de la Musique; she also received César and Lumières Award nominations for Best Actress for her work in Promise at Dawn. Further screen projects from this period encompassed Gaspar Noé’s 2019 feature Lux Æterna, 2020’s Suzanna Andler, and the 2021 film Jane by Charlotte, a documentary exploration of her relationship with her mother that she directed. In March 2022 she joined Soundwalk Collective on Lovotic, a release examining potential emotional and sexual connections between humans and robots that also included Atom™, Lyra Pramuk, and her Antichrist co-star Dafoe; the project appeared on the collective’s Analogue Foundation label and followed their earlier 2020 collaboration The Time of Night.
Albums
Singles
