Le bouchon [English translation]

Welcome to those who have just joined us on Radio Traffic. Let me remind you of the main news on this sunny afternoon, a record jam is taking place right now on the…. Some people have been stuck there for as many as three hours. Our thoughts go out to our listeners ‘on the inside’. Just to remind you of the security advice: stay in your cars, don’t open the doors, arm yourselves with patience and above all don’t forget…

He jams the radio to off, he hasn’t slept the whole night long

In the back they’re making fun of him he hasn’t been driving for long

But coming back from clubbing is always better in a car as opposed to a bus

Looking in the rear view mirror he sees a beautiful ‘voiture de luxe’

He’s proud of it, his new car, no one’s even scratched it yet

He’s crazy about it, it reassures him, but he hasn’t finished paying for it yet

It seduced him to get it on credit now he has to pay it back

But better that than have an old banger like that one, what a pile of crap

Inside someone lives, she’s already at home so has no need to rush away,

Her whole life in the glove box, and in the boot a big duvet

She’s just lost her apartment, all she’s got left is her Clio,

The hazard lights of her life are on, but no one notices them glow

A young man stuck in this traffic jam isn’t feeling well at all

Because his wife’s in the middle of giving birth, awaiting him at the hospital

His phone rings, he answers, his face brightens, no longer sad

…...The young man has just become a dad

On the road all the year he encounters millions of traffic jams

At Christmas his yellow Christmas tree decorates the van

From Toulouse to Tours, from Marseille to Lyon,

His wife’s like his spare wheel if he needs someone to lean on

Stay with us, we’ll bring you more information as it comes on the

The traffic jam, the the the traffic jam

We struggle, we grumble, we rage in the traffic jam

The traffic jam The the the traffic jam

We roll, we wriggle, we cough in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam we cry, we laugh, we pray in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam

And pretty often are lives are a lot like this traffic jam

She’s still driving though she’s older than her own old Ford

There’s a photo of her grandson resting on the dashboard

She thinks over her life as she touches her hair

Because she knows the hearse is only a few cars away from there

C’mon, fucking MOVE you old lady, can’t you go faster than that?

Like her family car she’s about to crack

'Mummy are we nearly there?' Her son’s overexcited again

The little one makes faces through the window at the car next to them

Nothing will make him smile, though the kid does catch his eye

A Renaud, grey, like his complexion, accompanied with a sigh

She’s left him for another man, some conquest or another,

But he can still smell her perfume on the seat cover

He’s sick of being trapped here this line goes on forever,

Face puffy, frowning, he’s at the end of his tether,

His leather sofa, his TV, he can’t wait to arrive

All this because of some idiot who doesn’t know how to drive!

The traffic jam, the the traffic jam

We struggle, we grumble, we rage in the traffic jam

The traffic jam The the the traffic jam

We roll, we wriggle, we cough in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam we cry, we laugh, we pray in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam

And pretty often are lives are a lot like this traffic jam

On the radio the old woman hears that a little girl has been forgotten in the traffic jam at a service station

In the car behind the mother- annoyed and concentrated does’t realise that the seat next to her son is vacant

The young driver got so smashed again the previous day he

doesn’t realise that the hearse is closer to him than to the old lady

The truck driver is on his last few miles of his last week, it’s tough

But he’s about to retire to the sides of the woman he loves

Under the seat full of holes which is her bed in her car

Hides a life changing lottery ticket which will take her far

The fake rich guy who’s lying to himself and staring her down

Doesn’t know that pretty soon their vehicles will be switched around

The disappointed lover who who keeps reading that last message

Doesn’t know that she’s also in this traffic jam and that she regrets it

The man who rages about the afternoon-ruining idiot, hasn’t yet learned

That it was his brother who drove through a barrier, whose car overturned

His child could become a truck driver, a mother, unemployed

Have chains of gold or end up sleeping alone, roofless, outside

But there’s one thing, which seems to the young father, clearer by far,

That he first present he’ll give the baby will be a little toy car

The traffic jam, the the traffic jam

We struggle, we grumble, we rage in the traffic jam

The traffic jam The the the traffic jam

We roll, we wriggle, we cough in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam we cry, we laugh, we pray in the traffic jam

The traffic jam the the traffic jam

And pretty often are lives are a lot like this traffic jam