Pink Elephants

10/22/1997 3:00 AM, LAUNCH
Alexandra Marshall

Mick Harvey amazed us all with Intoxicated Man . Not that the Bad Seeds are any strangers to camp, but a full length tribute to Serge Gainsbourg? No matter how cutting-edge Gainsbourg's racy pop was in his heyday, an LP of '60s French pop covers seemed a bit self-indulgent on Monsieur Harvey's part, non? Nevertheless, two seconds into that brilliant, lounge-by-way-of-the-gutter CD, downtown cocktail parties far and wide found a new soundtrack. Harvey managed to translate what edge Gainsbourg once had into a very modern paean tolouche sleaze. A year or so later, we discover that Harvey's perverse Francophilia wasn't sated. But where Intoxicated's tinges of gloom and guitars were easily incorporated into Harvey's existing oeuvre, Pink Elephants is a bit more outré. Harvey has distilled Gainsbourg's febrile quirkiness even further, and the result is a kookier, more eclectic group of songs. The organs are swirlier, the swinging arrangements a bit more pared down, the tone and mood swings more volatile, and the overall malaise more surreal. Never fear, though: today's Bardot, Anita Lane, is back, this time in the form of "I Love You...Nor Do I," a characteristically breathy, randy duet with ex-beau Nick Cave