Weekly Music Roundup: Cécile McLorin Salvant, Ala.Ni, and Mon Laferte
This week, new songs from Cécile McLorin Salvant, Ala.Ni, and Mon Laferte. Plus Miley Cyrus’s experimental side and a Mary Lattimore/Julianna Barwick duet.
Oh Snap! It’s A New Album by Cécile McLorin Salvant
From the beginning it was clear to anyone who was listening closely that Cécile McLorin Salvant was not just another gifted jazz singer. Over the course of the last decade and a half, she’s found her own way into the Great American Songbook while composing her own music and casting a wide sonic net for other sounds and, occasionally, forgotten songs. Now she’s released Oh Snap, and it features some of her most idiosyncratic and uncategorizable music yet. The title track sees McLorin Salvant singing and playing the synthesizer, accompanied only by a pair of percussionists. First it seems like a trippy jazz song atop a headlong rush of hand drums, but then the beat switches to a house groove; meanwhile, the melody gently bounces up and down in a quiet display of virtuosity. McLorin Salvant’s ethereal vocals have a streetwise element to them – “oh snap” are the first words she sings, and later on at one point it becomes “oh shit,” just to confound would-be radio programmers like me.
Ala.Ni Returns With A Long-Delayed Second Album
The singer/songwriter/producer Ala.Ni was born in Britain to parents from Granada and has been based in Paris. Like Cecile McLorin Salvant, she has a voice that can seemingly do anything, and her debut album, back in 2017, was mightily impressive. Ala.Ni gave us tracks full of smoky jazz vocals, others that had a bedroom pop feel, and some that just used the voice as an instrument. It’s taken a while, but she has now released her second album, Sunshine Music, and while the focus remains on her remarkably flexible voice, this time she gets a little more expansive with her arrangements. “Summer Meadows” is a gently swinging number with a tropical rhythm and Latin-style horn section. There are obvious elements of jazz and perhaps of Brazilian music, but also a hint of trap reggaeton in this charming, subtly complex song.
Mon Laferte Enlists Nathy Peluso For A Classic-Sounding Single
The Chilean-Mexican singer Mon Laferte reaches back to the big, orchestral sound of 20th century boleros in her new single “La Tirana,” a style that neatly fits her melodramatic, telenovela-ready sound. “Tengo problemas de amor,” she coos at the start of the song – “I have problems with love” – but when the time comes in the chorus to really let the emotions show, she enlists the Argentine/Spanish singer Nathy Peluso to join in. Somehow, they sound both heartbroken and unbreakable all at once.
Mary Lattimore and Julianna Barwick, Together Again
Harpist Mary Lattimore and vocalist/keyboardist Julianna Barwick are two leading figures in the more ambient end of the experimental music scene, and have toured together. Now they’ve put out a piece called “Perpetual Adoration,” the result of an offer to play some of the historic instruments in the Musee de la Musique in Paris. Lattimore’s harp sound is usually highly processed, and that seems to be the case here as the piece progresses, but evidently it’s a vintage harp, paired with Barwick’s ethereal wordless vocals and equally atmospheric synthesizers (presumably not so historic?). The work gradually builds up layers of sound, creating a dreamy, almost hymn-like soundscape, before letting us down easy with Lattimore’s (or more precisely, the museum’s) harp getting the last word.
Miley Cyrus Invites David Byrne To Join Her On The Dark Side
Miley Cyrus has just released a deluxe version of her recent LP Something Beautiful, and it includes two new tracks: one is “Secrets,” a pop song in the Fleetwood Mac mode – somewhat inevitably, as it features both Mick Fleetwood and Lindsey Buckingham from that band. But the real surprise is “Lockdown,” a dark-hued, downtempo song done with David Byrne. This is decidedly not pop music; it’s a 13-minute opus that begins with Cyrus singing in her lower register and Byrne replying in his highest, and that leads into a lengthy instrumental section that features ambient electronic textures, shuffling drums, and wisps of vocal sounds. After wandering in this sonic wilderness for a good eight or nine minutes, it finally makes its way back to the more conventional verse/chorus of the beginning.
