In the swim: Naim’s new record, which includes the Mac-selling song “New Soul,” has sold more than 200,000 copies in France. It goes on sale here next week.
by Caroline Lagnado Special To The Jewish Week
If you’ve been wondering whose sweet voice has been in your head making you want to buy a new Mac laptop, it’s none other than Yael Naim’s. While the name might not ring a bell (yet), the French-Israeli singer who speaks and sings in fluent (if charmingly accented) English is still a bit surprised about how her little song, “New Soul,” ended up in a major ad campaign, which pushed it to the No. 1 spot in the iTunes store.
Next week will be one of Naim’s biggest stateside. On March 14 she will perform on the “Ellen” show, on March 18 she will release her CD, “Yael Naim,” in the US, and on March 19 she will make her New York debut at the
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Bowery Ballroom in New York City.
Born 29 years ago to Tunisian-Jewish parents in Paris, she moved with her family to the Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Hasharon when she was 4. Speaking from Paris during a telephone interview with The Jewish Week, she describes her family as “really artistic.” They raised her to love music — she first heard the Beatles at home thanks to her father who “loves to sing and play guitar.” Though her education focused more on classical music (“After I saw the film ‘Amadeus,’ there was only one thing I wanted to do and that was write symphonies.”) Naim turned to rock music and listened to Joni Mitchell and Aretha Franklin.
Naim studied music throughout her childhood, and when it came time for her to serve in the Israeli Army, she passed the audition for the Air Force Band. That kept the petite songstress away from combat. Instead, she entertained soldiers and visiting officials. Naim was then invited to Paris to perform at a charity concert in 2000, where producers from the EMI record label heard her sing and gave her a contract.
The French-Jewish director, Elie Chouraqui, also took note of her talent, and Naim was chosen to portray Miriam in his play, “The Ten Commandments.” Chouraqui also hired Naim to work on the soundtrack for his film, “Harrison’s Flowers,” in 2001.
That same year, Naim’s first CD, “In a Man’s Womb,” was released through EMI, but it didn’t do well commercially. “I was completely disillusioned,” Naim remembered. She has since come a long way — with “New Soul,” currently No. 9 on the charts, she has become the first Israeli ever to make it to the Billboard Top 10.
Naim calls Paris home once again. She is open about her Israeli identity in France, and she has been embraced by a country not always — and not currently — known to be friendly to Israelis and Jews. Though her songs are mainly in Hebrew and English, Naim’s music can be heard on French radio and she can be seen on French TV. She has even met with Simone Veil, the powerful French-Jewish politician. Naim lives centrally, near the Bastille, and returns to Israel often. She is hoping to launch a concert tour of Israel soon.
Naim speaks warmly of the French capital, where she has built a life for herself. “Paris is a big city,” Naim says, “where people come from all over the world. The doors were open [here] and I met really nice people.”
One of those people was David Donatien, whom she credits with turning her music, and consequently her career, around. A West Indian multi-instrumentalist with no connection to Judaism or Israel, it was he who encouraged Naim to sing in Hebrew. Donatien could work with Naim’s music as an outsider, without understanding the lyrics, and give it musical direction.
They worked in Naim’s apartment, preparing a mix of pop and folk songs. “In the beginning [the CD] was 10 ballads in Hebrew so... there was no chance it would be released in France,” Naim says. She went on: “We did everything completely opposite of whatever you have to do with success.” The songs are sung in a mix of English and Hebrew with a touch of French.
Besides “New Soul,” from the Mac commercial, the “Yael Naim” release features a cover of Britney Spears’ song, “Toxic,” which has been receiving a lot of attention as well. Naim, who is “not really a fan” of Spears, had the “idea to take something really far from the music — like really, really commercial to intimate. It was a game at first,” Naim admitted. Both Naim’s voice and the piano-driven cover of “Toxic” are quiet and haunting — a far cry from Spears’ hyperactive original version.
The CD’s accompanying booklet will be printed in both English and Hebrew and the songs on “Yael Naim,” mainly inspired by events in Naim’s life, often discuss love and loss. Naim came up with the idea for “Far Far,” a dreamy English song, when she was younger and would stay awake nights writing songs and listening to music by the Beatles and Joni Mitchell, and seeing colors. She sings of seeing “a beautiful mess inside,” one of “oil skies and aquarelle rivers.” Naim says, “When you’re a teenager you live everything much stronger.”
In “7 Baboker” (7 In the Morning), a sadder song, Naim sings of the period when her longtime boyfriend left her — writing it “was like keeping the past with me more, holding it a little bit more.” Her CD ends on an uplifting note, with “Endless Song of Happiness,” which is sung in Hebrew.
So far, nearly 18,500 digital albums have been sold on iTunes, and Apple will continue to run its commercial through March and potentially longer, picking up on the growing buzz around the newest star it has helped to create. The CD has sold more than 200,000 copies in France. “It’s an old dream,” Naim says of her success, “and now it’s reality.”
Yael Naim will perform Wednesday, March 19, at 8 p.m. at the Bowery Ballroom, 6 Delancey St., Manhattan. (212) 533-2111.
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