High Heels Movies

Asked & Answered | Catherine Ringer

Imagine a lissome Parisienne in short skirt and high heels, lit Gauloise dangling from pursed red lips as she steps out of some smoky Left Bank boîte. Now imagine what she sounds like, and you have Catherine Ringer (pronounced Rahn-ZHAY). Forceful but suave, more Garbo than Gaga, Ringer, 53, was the lead singer of Les Rita Mitsouko, the high-energy, genre-bending pop duo that ruled the airwaves in France for much of the 1980s and ’90s.

The group’s jaunty, sometimes moody, and always lyrically crafty songs sounded like no other French band of its time. With an image cultivated by the photographer Jean-Baptiste Mondino, who shot their videos, and with collaborations with the likes of Sparks and Iggy Pop, Les Rita Mitsouko earned not only a place in France’s pop pantheon but also a cult following among Anglo audiences. (Inclusion in a few ’80s movies also helped; “Singing in the Shower” can be heard in Ridley Scott’s “Black Rain,” and “Tongue Dance” makes a splash in “The Handmaid’s Tale.”) Ringer recently released her first solo album, “Ring n’ Roll,” and will perform today at 6:30 p.m. in Central Park as part of the Fête de la Musique. T got her on the phone during a downtown stroll.

Les Rita Mitsouko’s music was like the pop soundtrack to Paris in the 1980s. What was it like for you then, at the peak of the group’s popularity?

Well, it was great. At the same time, it’s not, never was, an objective to be popular. I know that it can come and go.

I remember walking into the Duplex bar in Paris in 1991 and hearing “Un Soir, Un Chien” from “The No Comprendo” album. The bar was filled with smoke. Everybody was thin. So French. Do you think there was something uniquely French about Les Rita Mitsouko’s sound?

We are French, of course, so it was always a mixture of modern French songs and pop rock. Maybe being a French band, we had a bit of a different outlook compared to, say, British and American bands at the time.

That song — a lush ballad — translates as “One Night, a Dog.” Why is it called that?

It’s a reference to Iggy Pop’s “I Wanna Be Your Dog.” That kind of dog. (Laughs)

Though they’re pop, there’s also an allegorical element to many of Les Rita’s songs. I’m thinking of “La Sorcière et L’Inquisiteur” or “Triton.” What’s that all about?