Cibelle

The debut album from the Brazilian singer made semi-famous as the voice on Yugoslavian/Brazilian pianist Suba's hit album. The lyrics and songs are essentially all written by Cibelle over the course of a few months surrounding the creation of the album, and the sound was engineered by Cibelle along with Apollo 9, an up-and-coming Brazilian producer. To add to the pot, a couple of the musical minds behind Morcheeba lent a hand in the process. The songs are in large part ballads, capitalizing on Cibelle's outstanding voice. There is a stray samba involved (as must be done in any proper Brazilian album), "So Vei Viver No Samba." There's a bit of clumsy rapping involved too, clumsy more from lack of experience than from a lack of rapping ability. It's when she gets into a basic, groove-thick ballad that Cibelle really shines here. Equally capable in Portuguese and English, she can move the tracks forward almost entirely by her voice, with some decent, if not shining, backing sounds ranging from the basic string arrangements to bits of birdcalls and city sounds. Overall, it's not a bad album at all, with a thoroughly laid-back sensibility. For something that lays somewhere between samba and progressive MPB, this isn't a bad way to go.