Search - Cocorosie :: La Maison De Mon Reve

A Tale of Two Sisters

Juan Mobili | Valley Cottage, NY USA | 02/22/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Their voices tone and phrasing may remind you of Joanna Newson or Devendra Banhart, respectively. At times innocent as children yet weathered as the voices in old folk Appalachian songs.

This album is beautiful but not necessarily easy to love specially if the people mentioned above are not particular tastes of yours.

You might have heard the story already so I'll keep it short. Two sisters estranged as children, one street musician, the other one studying Opera in Paris, finally reunite. This album is the product of their growing friendship, just as unpredictable and perfect and unassumingly touching.

To mention songs -possible, each may be your pearl- would be to betray the continuous spell the album offers. Although the songs are not meant to compose a suite, this album is a collection of sorts. Perhaps, you may imagine a childhood scrapbook made of songs.

The experience is rewarding, likely to get you a little tender, under a spell. All good things.

"

"Tiny field mice singing gospel"

Maria | Hong Kong | 06/22/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"La Maison De Mon R?ve is essentially a tale of two sisters' dreams and fantasies: CocoRosie are Sierra and Bianca Casady, two Brooklyn siblings - the former a student of classical opera in Rome and Paris, the latter a wild child who started singing a cappella on street corners and bars - who rediscover one another in Paris, city of dreams. They hole themselves up in a small apartment in the 18?me arrondissement in the spring of 2003 and eventually surface with this music box of sleepy-eyed, light-as-air melodies. This is an album that compels you to make 'if' conjectures: if Le Fabuleux Destin d'Am?lie Poulain had been an album, it would have sounded like this; if Bj?rk ever picked up an acoustic guitar and lived in a van in Alaska like Jewel, this would have been the result. The first song, Terrible Angels, sums up the mood perfectly as the ambient noises of the sisters' Paris flat and recorded barnyard animal noises add idiosyncrasy to the questioning, childlike vocal duet: "If every angel's terrible, then why do you welcome them?" The wistful, helium-pitched gospel stylings of By Your Side add a faded linoleum tinge, as Sierra warbles "I'd wear your black eyes, bake you apple pies...I just wanted to be your housewife", while listening to the unpolished, organic '70s style acoustic guitar melody of Good Friday is like eavesdropping on the two sisters as they tinker away quietly in their white-shuttered flat. The tinny sounds of Tahiti Rain Song evoke ethnic music heard through a scratchy, broken-down transistor radio while sitting in a thatched hut in a steamy jungle. Their record company labels them "tiny field mice singing gospel" and, for once, the hype is spot on."

The Hissing of Summer Tape

Demetrius A. Armstrong | Huntington, WV USA | 01/04/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Recorded by two sisters in springtime Paris, "Le Maison De Mon Reve" is at once one of the most challenging and beautiful records you'll ever hear. It shows the power of the things that connect us, since these sisters had been estranged since they were young girls (they credited this to two incredibly strong personalities). They both happened to be musicians, one a classically trained opera singer, the other a street corner folk musician, two sides of the same coin after all. When they reunited they found unique things to muse over, and recorded a brilliant album using a lot of the things most people take for granted (like rain for example). They took what seemed like a simple 4-track, an inexpensive microphone, and a whole lot of creative intuition and turned it into one stunning song after the other, like carpenters fashion simple blocks of wood. Upon taking in the completely molded "Le Maison De Mon Reve", it has the same otherworldly feel musically as any Cocteau Twins album, but it manages an intimacy that is indigenous to it and it's immediate surroundings. This is because they turned the limitation of their recording style into an asset, and it became an instrument as well. The warm hissing of tape is just as essential here as the strumming of their guitar, or the clever hip-hop samples they employed, and it says a sunny spring day after rain better than anything they could have used. It's rare that something comes along so different, that you have no immediate reference point to refer it to. CocoRosie and "Le Maison De Mon Reve" are one of those rare things."