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David Bowie sings his hit ‘Heroes’ in French

As the world reacts to the news of David Bowie's death, have a listen to him singing his 1977 classic Heroes - in French.

Published: 11 January 2016 11:41 CET

David Bowie sings his hit 'Heroes' in French

David Bowie during a press conference at the 36th Cannes Film Festival in 1983. Photo: AFP

The world was shocked on Monday to hear that pop superstar David Bowie passed away after “a courageous 18 month battle with cancer”, his team said in a statement.

As most fans reminisce with some of his classic hits, here's one you probably haven't heard – Heroes in French (or Héros as it was called here).

The song was released in 1977 along with a German version called Helden. Listen here:

The video below is another version of the same song, in both English and French, along with French lyrics on the screen so you can sing along at home.

RIP David Bowie. 1947 – 2016.

We can be heroes, just for one day.

Or as the great man sang himself – “On peut être héros, pour juste une journée.”

Below are images of the British singer performing on stage at the Auteuil's Hippodrome in Paris, on June 9, 1983.

Photos: AFP

New songs mark sixth anniversary of French star Johnny Hallyday's death

Hallyday, blessed with a powerful husky voice and seemingly boundless energy, died in December 2017, aged 74, of lung cancer after a long music and acting career.

After an estimated 110 million records sold during his lifetime – making him one of the world’s best-selling singers -Hallyday’s success has continued unabated beyond his death.

Almost half of his current listeners on Spotify are under the age of 35, according to the streaming service, and a posthumous greatest hits collection of “France’s favourite rock’n’roller”, whose real name was Jean-Philippe Leo
Smet, sold more than half a million copies.

The two new songs, Un cri (A cry) and Grave-moi le coeur (Engrave my heart), are featured on two albums published by different labels which also contain already-known hits in remastered or symphonic versions.

Un cri was written in 2017 by guitarist and producer Maxim Nucci – better known as Yodelice – who worked with Hallyday during the singer’s final years.

At the time Hallyday had just learned that his cancer had returned, and he “felt the need to make music outside the framework of an album,” Yodelice told reporters this week.

Hallyday recorded a demo version of the song, accompanied only by an acoustic blues guitar, but never brought it to full production.

Sensing the fans’ unbroken love for Hallyday, Yodelice decided to finish the job.

He separated the voice track from the guitar which he felt was too tame, and arranged a rockier, full-band accompaniment.

“It felt like I was playing with my buddy,” he said.

The second song, Grave-moi le coeur, is to be published in December under the artistic responsibility of another of the singer’s close collaborators, the arranger Yvan Cassar.

Hallyday recorded the song – a French version of Elvis’s Love Me Tender – with a view to performing it at a 1996 show in Las Vegas.

But in the end he did not play it live, opting instead for the original English-language version, and did not include it in any album.

“This may sound crazy, but the song was on a rehearsal tape that had never been digitalised,” Cassar told AFP.

The new songs are unlikely to be the last of new Hallyday tunes to delight fans, a source with knowledge of his work said. “There’s still a huge mass of recordings out there spanning his whole career,” the source said.

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