Crate Digger: SHUKY & AVIVA Je t’aime un peu trop
Shuky & Aviva Je t’aime un peu trop (Tempo 1975), Turkish Issue
This is an odd one for me. I picked up my copy in a Turkish junk shop along with a few devotional discs and a battered Turkish Stateside copy of George Baker Selections ‘Little Green Bag’ on a yellow label I’d never seen before. As excited as I was to get the little haul home it was this one that made the biggest impression on me.
Shuky and Aviva were like many mid-seventies Pop acts… lots of hair, glossy production, European, and sounding a bit like ABBA, as bad as all that can sound don’t let it put you off.
Je t’aime un Peu trop (I love you a bit too much for all of us that failed French class out there) is as glorious a slab of seventies euro-pop as was ever committed to vinyl. It’s the best euro vision winner there never was, as it’s perfectly suited to the competition. From the first jangle of bright Bazouki/Mandolin to the ‘Wah wah wah wah wah wah wah’ backing vocals its powerful slightly middle eastern beat makes me want to strap on stack heels and break an ankle (this would inevitably happen) It’s no surprise that Shuki Levi (Shuky) composed the 1981 Israeli Eurovision entry ‘Haylala’ and although I have never heard it he should have gone with this one instead.
Unbeknownst to me, Levy’s best-known work soundtracked my childhood years as he wrote the theme tunes for cartoons that appeared nightly on UK screens in the 1980s. Who could forget the ‘duh duh duh duh Da-duh’ of Inspector Gadget, the magnificent bombast of The Mysterious Cities of Gold, as well as He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, She-Ra: Princess of Power, and Jayce and the Wheeled Warriors. Sometimes the theme tune was the best thing about these shows, the memories of them far better than the actual content itself. Nostalgia is a slippery customer, YouTube viewings of childhood faves can prove very unsatisfactory at times.
Nostalgia is far less slippery than the aforementioned Shuky it seems, as he was at the centre of a scandal over publishing rights, scamming other composers out of their composer’s rights, and registering works as his own. 3978 of them no less! A practice as old as publishing. I suppose all that Seventies gloss and hope couldn’t last. I am however going to remember Shuky as I have seen him in the television appearances on YouTube. Dressed in a white satin jumpsuit, flowing hair, a dark and full Mustache, twinkling eyes as he lightly holds the Mic and gazes into the lovely Aviva’s eyes. A hint of eastern promise on his lips. After all, I might be the only one out there that really loves this song, allow me to wallow in the Nostalgia for a while. Maybe, just maybe, I love it a bit too much.
SHUKY & AVIVA Je t’aime un peu trop
Artist photo via Facebook // Album artwork via CDandLP
Written-By Michel Jourdan, Shuki Levy
“Crate Digger Confidential…A Lifelong obsession with plastic discs laid bare. Don’t expect just reviews of records, it’s much more important to me than that.“