Search - Swan Dive :: Until

Summer breeze, makes me feel fine...

Sound/Word Enthusiast | Rhode Island, USA | 08/07/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"...a Swin Dive bossa nova album isn't that big of a surprise -- they have long championed the bossa's potential for harmonic sophistication, wistful sentiment, and ba-ba-ba lounge kitsch (that last element more of a product of bossa's Americanization than its original Brasilian incarnation).



And yeah, it's good: Bill DeMain and Brad Jones are twin pillars of their respective crafts (songwriting and engineering/producing), and they have produced a colorful, playful collection of tunes and performances that have a certain stylistic consistency, yet enough variation in texture and pallette to work as an album. There's a little samba here, a little pedal steel there...nice surprises throughout.



Molly Felder remains a luminous presence, her voice carassing the soft edges of the (mostly) Demain-composed (and co-composed) material. To Swan Dive's credit, they eschew hoary covers -- always a bossa album pitfall.



Any shortcomings here are the same ones that plague any Swan Dive album...they don't really subvert or personalize the genres they tackle, prefering to work the surface with exceptional skill and precision. The songs sometimes sound more like tributes to bossa than personal statements, but I don't think anyone expects them to up-end the genre a la Arnaldo Antunes or anything.



All in all, a lovely new wrinkle the ever-expanding Swan Dive tapestry...

"