Nouvelle Vague

Bearing a name that translates as “new wave” in French and “bossa nova” in Portuguese, Nouvelle Vague’s title encapsulates the project’s guiding idea of revisiting new wave staples through a Brazilian pop filter. Producers Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux from France assembled a roster of young female vocalists who had never encountered the originals by the Clash, Dead Kennedys, and XTC that filled the 2004 album Nouvelle Vague, a factor that contributed to the record’s worldwide breakthrough. Later releases explored fresh shadings of the same premise, whether through guest appearances by the artists whose material was being reworked on 2009’s 3 or through the addition of newly written tracks on 2016’s I Could Be Happy. Even after Libaux’s death in 2021, the group sustained its playfully sultry and wistful takes on post-punk and new wave with the 2024 album Should I Stay or Should I Go.

Before forming Nouvelle Vague, Libaux performed in several French pop groups from the late ’80s into the ’90s, among them Les Objets, a collaboration with Jérôme Rousseaux shaped by British bands such as the Smiths and the Monochrome Set. Collin, for his part, worked with the trip-hop act Ollano, scored films including The Kidnapper’s Theme, and issued electronic music that ranged from dance-floor singles on Paper Recordings to broader experiments on Fcom and Output Records under the respective aliases Avril and Volga Select. The two first connected through mutual acquaintances in the late ’90s and discovered a mutual love of punk and new wave. In 2003—the year Libaux issued his debut solo album L’Héroïne au bain—the pair cut a bossa nova-inflected reading of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” Pleased with the outcome, Collin and Libaux developed the concept further by enlisting French and Brazilian singers who had not heard the source versions of songs such as XTC’s “Making Plans for Nigel,” thereby guaranteeing that each interpretation would stand on its own. Issued in Europe in 2004 and the United States the next year, Nouvelle Vague earned acclaim for its elegant renewal of new wave sounds, entered the French album charts, and surpassed half a million copies sold globally.

After a 2005 world tour supporting the debut, Nouvelle Vague delivered its follow-up A Bande a Part in June 2006. The set, which reimagined New Order’s “Blue Monday” and Blondie’s “Heart of Glass,” reached charts in France, Germany, Portugal, and the U.K. and earned gold certification across Europe. In the United States it climbed into the Top Ten of the Top Dance/Electronic Albums tally. Although Libaux released his second solo album Imbécile in 2007, Nouvelle Vague stayed active through a series of mixes and compilations that included a volume in the Late Night Tales series, the anthology New Wave collecting covers by the Flying Lizards, Duran Duran and others, and an entry in Stereo Deluxe’s Coming Home series spotlighting Collin’s favorite film music. Similarly, 2008’s Hollywood, Mon Amour applied the project’s approach to songs from ’80s films, featuring vocalists such as Juliette Lewis and Yael Naim. Guest singers remained central on the aptly titled third album 3, released in June 2009, where Ian McCulloch, Terry Hall, Martin Gore, and Barry Adamson joined the project’s regular vocalists on tracks that incorporated blues and country elements alongside bossa nova. Certified silver in Europe, 3 appeared on the French, German, and Portuguese charts.

For November 2010’s Couleurs sur Paris the group turned to French punk and post-punk from the ’70s and ’80s, aided by singers including Vanessa Paradis, Coeur de Pirate, and former Nouvelle Vague member Camille; the album charted in France and additional European territories. The following year brought The Singers, a compilation of tracks from the vocalists’ own projects that included Phoebe Killdeer & the Short Straws’ “Fade Out Lines,” which later became a European hit after a remix by the Avener. Acoustic, issued in 2012, captured highlights from a 2009 concert in Portugal.

Nouvelle Vague paused for several years while Collin co-wrote and produced Ya Nass, the first official album by Lebanese artist Yasmine Hamdan, and Libaux assembled Uncovered Queens of the Stone Age, a tribute featuring vocalists such as Emiliana Torrini, Inara George, and Katharine Whalen. The project resurfaced in 2016 with I Could Be Happy, pairing fresh songs penned by Libaux and Collin with the expected new wave and post-punk covers. Three years later the fifteenth anniversary was marked by a tour, the documentary Nouvelle Vague by Nouvelle Vague, and two collections: Rarities, comprising B-sides and scarce tracks, and Curiosities, gathering previously unreleased material. Libaux died in 2021 at age 57, yet Collin kept the enterprise active with live performances. Nouvelle Vague resurfaced with new recordings in February 2024 via Should I Stay or Should I Go. Reuniting Collin with original vocalist Mélanie Pain, the album presented covers of songs by Yazoo, Blondie, Duran Duran, the Clash, and others.