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Me and Armini
Rating: 5.3 | 0 User Reviews | Send to Friend
By Rick Sieber
Throughout her career, Emilínana Torrini has been all over the musical map: from early, cover-heavy blues and soul excursions, to Björk-lite electro-pop, to movie soundtrack noteriety (“Gollum’s Song” from Lord of the Rings: the Two Towers), Torrini’s appealingly kinetic approach most recently took a Euro-folkie turn with 2005’s Fisherman’s Woman. Eschewing that album’s sparse folk minimalism in favor of a much fuller, denser, groovier global pop approach, Torrini’s latest LP marks yet another shift in trajectory for the peripatetic Icelandic singer. Yet as commendable as her musically variable approach may be, I can’t help but wonder if this time around the change wasn’t necessarily for the better. The stark confessional quality of her previous outing may have elicited too many Nick Drake comparisons for anyone’s good, but at least it found Torrini in a truly sympathetic setting: foregrounding her gorgeous voice and couching it in the sort of haunting-yet-soothing arrangements that bring to mind fearless folkies like Joanna Newsom (and yes, Nick Drake). Perhaps hoping to shake such comparisons while expanding her audience, Me and Armini ups the pop factor significantly – “Big Jumps” might just be the stateside hit single she’s been steadily working towards – but it also tends to obscure her formidable vocal strengths as it diminishes the (still folksy) music’s emotional pull. Tight, polished, and professional this may be, but maybe those Nick Drake comparisons weren’t such a bad thing after all. (Rough Trade)
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