IRM is the French language name for MRI – magnetic resonance imaging – the method doctors use to see inside the body. The new album's title and its uneasy, apprehensive moods reflects Charlotte's recent experiences. She suffered a brain haemorrhage in 2007 during a waterskiing accident, was subsequently operated on and had repeated scans. She later found the sound of the scanner on the Internet, and incorporated that into her music.

A chance meeting with Beck at a White Stripes gig saw the seeds sown for this collaborative project, with Beck already having shown his admiration for Charlotte's dad Serge's work on his 2002 album Sea Changes, where he borrowed parts of Gainsbourg's classic Melody Nelson for the track Paper Tiger. And Beck's father David Campbell had arranged the strings on 5.55.

Charlotte fed Beck fragmentary lines, which he transformed into finished lyrics. And the music was heavily influenced by the films Gainsbourg was making, which creates an almost eclectic mix of moods and influences derived, in part, from her cinema roles.

What IRM is, more than anything, is a deeply personal record, full of reflective and enchanting tracks, full of melancholy and blurred brilliance. In The End is an absolute peach of a song, like something Marianne Faithful would have recorded in the 60s!

Beck's influences are easy to pick up on, too, and the combined effort has created an album of real quality.
Single Heaven Can Wait is released a fortnight before the album, featuring remixes by Jackson, Nosaj Thing and Grizzly Bear.

And multi-talented Gainsbourg, who recently won the Best Actress Award at Cannes for her role in Lars Von Trier's controversial Antichrist film, will shortly be announcing details of UK shows in early 2010.

Release Dates: January 11 and 25 respectively