I’ve been fairly unabashed in my praise of Toronto-born rocker Slim Twig. Two of my very most favorite albums of the the past two years are his creative handiworks, A Hound At The Hem and its worthy follow-up Thank You For Stickin’ With Twig, both out in America on DFA Records. And so without any further preamble—you can read my past ruminations on Slim Twig here and here—it’s my great pleasure today, here on the sacred herbal holiday of 420 Day to debut this video for Mr. Twig’s slinky, smoky cover of Serge Gainsbourg’s ode to “Cannabis.”
 

Slim Twig goes casual at the bowling alley

“Cannabis” comes from the soundtrack to a 1970 French film of the same name which actually stars Gainsbourg as well, portraying a hitman for the mafia who falls in love with Jane Birkin, the daughter of an ambassador. The original number was performed and written by Gainsbourg and orchestrated by his future Melody Nelson collaborator Jean-Claude Vannier. Cannabis, which was amusingly retitled French Intrigue for the puritanical US market, was uploaded in its entirety to YouTube. It’s in French, with no English subtitles, but you still get to see Serge as a gun-toting, rabbit-fur coat-wearing badass causing mayhem, smoking a lot of cigarettes and je t’aiming Jane Birkin as often as possible.

DFA have set up a special Weedtransfer site for legally purchasing “Cannabis” in digital or physical formats.

“In a scene like this, you get a contact-high!”