Rolling Stone's Artists to Watch: The Rockers and Rappers Who Will Dominate 2007

Charlotte Gainsbourg is better known as an actress than a musician — her films include 21 Grams, The Science of Sleep, the very creepy Lemming and a choice part in Todd Haynes' upcoming Dylan biopic, I'm Not There — but in France, she's most famous for being the daughter of the legendary singer Serge Gainsbourg. Before Charlotte was born, her parents (her mother is the singer and actress Jane Birkin) collaborated on the song "Je T'aime...Moi Non Plus," which fades out with an extended female orgasm. When Charlotte was twelve, she recorded her own duet with her father, "Lemon Incest." Sample lyric: "The love that we will never make together is the most beautiful...the most pure." Gainsbourg recorded a full-length pop album with her father when she was fifteen before giving up music in favor of acting. That all changed when the dudes from Air, themselves heavily influenced by Gainsbourg pere, agreed to write music for a new album. The result is 5:55, produced by Nigel Godrich (Radiohead, Beck) and featuring lyrical contributions from Jarvis Cocker and the Divine Comedy's Neil Hannon.

THE FORMULA (Feist + Edith Piaf) x Synths = Charlotte Gainsbourg

SOUND "I had influences, but they were mostly films," says Gainsbourg, 35. "I didn't talk much about music to [Air]. I talked about the images and ambience of certain films that made a big impression on me as a child. They all dealt with the night, isolation, dreams." Indeed, Gainsbourg's breathy English-language vocals and Air's hippest-elevator-music-in-the-world aesthetic sounds best after midnight.

MUST-HAVE TRACK "5:55"
Easy listening for the cool kids, with breathy vocals and atmospherics from Air.

DIRTY DAD "It made a lot of noise," admits Gainsbourg of "Lemon Incest." "But at that time, I was in boarding school and didn't hear a thing about it. Of course, my father knew what he was doing, and he wanted to shock people." Gainsbourg says her father was like a conductor in the studio, directing her performance, which was why she assumed she'd never make music without him. Did he offer any advice? "Never take singing lessons," Gainsbourg recalls. "That's it, basically." MARK BINELLI

Next: Lifesavas

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