Iconic 1960s French singer Francoise Hardy dies aged 80 after a long battle with cancer

Legendary French singer Francoise Hardy has died at the age of 80, her son said on Tuesday.

Thomas DuTronc said in a simple post to Instagram: 'Mum is gone.'

Hardy, known the world over for her crystalline voice and melancholy lyrics, suffered with different types of cancer, including lymphoma and laryngeal, since 2004. 

She broke through at just 18 with her first hit 'Tous les Garcons et les Filles' ('All the Boys and Girls') in 1962, and helped found the ye-ye movement, a pop-inspired cultural movement that embraced British and American rock in the 1960s.

Hardy was the only French artist to appear in a 2023 ranking of the greatest ever singers published by Rolling Stone magazine. 

Paris Match magazine quoted her as saying last year that she wanted to 'go soon and quickly, without much suffering'.

She was a leading advocate for assisted suicide near the end of her life, telling the magazine that it was 'inhumane' for France not to legalise the controversial procedure. 

'It is not for the doctors to accede to each request, but to shorten the unnecessary suffering of an incurable disease from the moment it becomes unbearable.'

She joked at the time that while she would've loved to have chosen to end her own life, 'given my small notoriety, no one will want to run the risk of being removed from the medical order even more.'

More to follow.