a short site about The Divine Comedy

French version

Who Were We?

Lyrics: Leos Carax / Neil Hannon

Music: Neil Hannon

Published by: Copyright Control / Sony/ATV Music Publishing

Originally interpreted by: Kylie Minogue

 

To see the lyrics, click on the name of the version you are interested in (on the left).

 

Informations

This song was co-written by Neil Hannon and Leos Carax for his movie ‘Holy Motors’ and sang by Kylie Minogue. The lyrics are dealing with the plot, as the title ‘Who Were We?’ is about who the characters (who are having lifes dedicated to the acting) were playing as a role when they first met.

The song was actually performed by Kylie live during the filming [1] as it is meant to be sung by Kylie’s character in the movie. The orchestral parts were recorded later in Berlin by Andrew Skeet.
The instrumental version of the song ends the movie, and a theme based on it is played every time the main character, Monsieur Oscar (played by Denis Lavant) is getting into a different role.

A demo version was actually recorded before the filming to help Kylie during the filming. It was a home demo recorded by Neil Hannon and featuring vocals by Cathy Davey [1].

None of these versions have been released on records.


[1] A.V. Club 24/10/2012