Rating: 3.75/5 
The content of Aimer et Perdre is well chosen. For an American audience, the English language songs spread across the two discs will obviously be the most immediately approachable. The Carter Family’s “I Never Will Marry,” Dock Boggs’ “False Hearted Lover’s Blues,” the Stoneman Family’s “Too Late” and Richard “Rabbit” Brown’s “Never Let the Same Bee Sting You Twice” essentially walk similar paths of lovelorn despair. “Life to me is a big mistake,” Brown sings in a sentiment that could easily also apply to the other three, though Boggs throws in a murder fantasy for good measure. If there’s a benefit to be had in the veritable cottage industry that’s sprouted up as labels look to the country’s past for material, it’s that gems such as these receive their proper due.
The liner notes wisely provide lyrical translations for the tunes on Aimer et Perdre, which go a long way in giving the listener a sense of what these songs are actually about. Without these, a great line like, “He is now on his way to the pub/ Jingling coins” – sang from the point of view of a spurned woman whose man goes out on a bender – from “Uwiedziona Dziewczyna” would go unnoticed. Though an ocean away, Cajun tracks like “Aimer et Perdre,” “L’Abandonnér” and “Quelqu’un est Jaloux” are of a like mind, very often evoking a large degree of personal desolation brought on from being rejected or just unlucky in love. A fatalistic lyric like, “I’m going back home/ To die all alone,” (from “L’Abandonnér”) might sound melodramatic, but is in many ways a nice encapsulation of these songs’ miserable temperaments.
The manner in which the songs are ordered and presented, however, is perplexing. The album is not arranged by region, chronology or even style; instead, it seemingly haphazardly jumps around from year to year and culture to culture. It’s a curious decision, as this approach tends to negate the songs’ historical context in favor of what holds them together thematically, and any real appreciation of these songs rests firmly in Christopher King’s richly detailed liner notes. The way the album is sequenced eventually makes Aimer et Perdre feel like two or three separate albums crammed onto a single release; it might sound tedious, but grouping the songs according to their origins and recording date makes for a more logical listening experience.
Still, ultimately it’s the content that counts, and for listeners who like such archival albums, it’s a worthy release. While it might reach a limited audience, Aimer et Perdre ably explores the concept of love and its wide range of consequences, drawing a connection between ourselves today and these musicians from far more distant, and different, times.
