Shine of Dried Electric Leaves

Cibelle | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (May 2, 2006)
• Original Release Date: 2006
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Six Degrees
• ASIN: B000EZ8ZSA
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #122,746 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #66 in Music > Latin Music > Urban > Latin Electronica

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Since her breakout performance on Suba's landmark Sao Paolo Confessions, singer Cibelle (pronounced see-Bell-ee) has enchanted Brazilian pop aficionados with her lovely musical purr. Here on her second album, the cool lounge production of her debut is pushed into a darker, more experimental realm without losing her music's sensual beauty. As ambitious as the production, the songwriting is challenging too with highlights like "Phoenix" and "Flying High" using a linear style rather than the back and forth of a verse, bridge and chorus arrangement. There's a couple of interesting covers as well--while her spare version of Tom Waits's "Green Grass" is a seemingly offbeat choice, her haunting, glitchy and near-unrecognizable cover of Jobim's "Por Toda A Minha Vida" is a different kind of surprise. With ultra-cool Apollo Nove and Tunng in the producers' chair, this subtle kind of sonic and music revision is to be expected, but it's a tribute to the singer that she keeps the challenging sound under the sway of her lovely voice. --Tad Hendrickson

Product Description

Like no one else, Brazilian born Cibelle makes use of a variety of elements to create unique, imaginative and enchanting peices of music. Her second album (the follow-up to 2003's inspired eponymous debut) is a genuine masterpiece. Moving into even more adventurous sonic terrain than its predecesor, the "Shine Of Dried Electric Leaves" combines rootsy acoustic instrumentation, electronic processing, noise guitars & children's toys, captivating textural soundscapes & pure melodies all anchored by Cibelle's unmistakable, moving voice. Cibelle produced this album over a period of 18 months, taking some of the tracks with her from London (where she now resides) to Sao Paulo (her home town) and back, gathering along the way contributions from various co-producers and performers, including Mike Lindsay (from UK Folktronica act Tunng);Apollo Nove (the innovative producer/artist from Sao Paulo, who produced most of her debut album); Parisian mixer, Yann Arnaud (Air, ! Sebastien Schuller), and guests such as Seu Jorge (of "City of God" and "The Life Aquatic' fame), freak folk pioneer, Devendra Banhart, and CocoRosie collaborator Spleen. While some of the album's ten original compositions and three covers are simple, limpid crytalline gems (her renditions of Tom Waits' "Green Grass" and of Jobim's "Por Toda Minha Vida" to name but a few).

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Appearances Can Be Deceiving, May 8, 2006

By 

Tom "tomintoronto" (Toronto,, Ontario, Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shine of Dried Electric Leaves (Audio CD)

Check out the pose on the CD cover. Cibelle looks every inch the beautiful formal model that she is. And she wears evening gowns in concert to heighten the effect. But here is the catch: the evening gown she wore when I saw her looked like a 1960's prom model, and she was wearing it sideways. Cibelle is definitely different.

She has a great voice, but there are as many female vocalists in Brazil with great voices as their are great football players. What sets her apart is her sense of adventure. Most of her material is, in whole or in part, way out there. A veteran of the superb Suba sessions, she has continued to develop in original and startling ways. Her music is not always easy to listen to, but it is always worth the effort. The directions her songs take are often wildly unpredictable with the most sophisticated electronic embellishments quickly followed by a glockenspiel, for instance. She likes to stretch and bend rhythms and to reinvent genres, and she is obviously quite comfortable in challenging her audience. Worth noting, she doesn't just rely on fresh, daring song writers: she co-wrote half the songs on the album.

It's not a perfect album. She does the "sex kitten" vocal thing a tad too often, and some of the English lyrics probably should have stayed in Portuguese. But both those are small quibbles. She, not Bebel Gilberto, not Maria Rita, is the most important female artist to emerge in Brazil since Maria Monte, and this CD is even better than her first solo album.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Experimental and beautiful electro-bossa, November 14, 2006

By 

MUSiCOLOGY - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shine of Dried Electric Leaves (Audio CD)

Like Bebel Gilberto, Brazilian Cibelle made her name working with the ill-fated Serbian producer Suba (both starred on his first and last album "Sao Paulo Confessions"), and Cibelle's first album explored similar electro-bossa territory.

Her second outing sees her move into a much more wobbly acoustic terrain, assisted by Mike Lindsay from folktronica duo Tunng and by the Moogy Brazilian psych-funk producer Apollo Nove.

Cibelle (pronounced `see-belly', apparently) has a similarly winsome voice to Bebel Gilberto, although she doesn't sing with such a strong Brazilian accent.

She retains some links to Brazilian music: Devendra Banhart duets on a pleasingly giggly reading of Caetano Veloso's charming "London London", "The Life Aquatic" star Seu Jorge lays down some bossa nova guitar lines on "Arrête Lâ, Menina" and there's an ambient electronic version of Tom Jobim's "Por Toda a Minha Vida".

But what really transforms this album are the idiosyncratic and distinctly un-Brazilian rhythm tracks, recorded using a Matthew Herbert-ish arsenal of kitchenware (spoons, paper cups, plastic bottles, wooden boxes, etc).

Think a Brazilian Björk and you're nearly there.

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Not as accessible as her debut but still good, May 26, 2006

By 

JG "wordmule" (...onward....thru the fog!) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Shine of Dried Electric Leaves (Audio CD)

The cover of Dried Electric leaves is appropriately a collage of images, some of Cibelle herself, and the rest of disparate other items, etc. A collage on the cover is appropriate because Cibelle, like a lot of Brazilian music, is a collage of all kinds of music from everywhere. If she didn't sing in Portuguese, you'd be hard pressed to say "this is Brazilian music".

Her self titled debut from 3 years ago can probably best be described as "psychedelic pop". Here, she's still psychedelic, but the mood is much more experimental and contemplative.

The album starts with a Tom Waits song, and while I haven't put the disc in the PC (it's supposed to have more details about the recording and the people involved) to confirm it, it sure sounds like Tom Waits lends his smoky backup vocals on the track.

The inimitable Seu Jorge shows up on another song. I can't remember if Laurie Anderson helped out on Cibelle's first CD or if it was on Bebel's. At any rate, this record has a lot more of a Laurie Anderson feel than it does, say Morcheeba feel like her first record. Her first record is great summer music for the pool or beach. This one may belong more at home between the speakers late at night.

No matter what your own take is on it, Cibelle is among one of the most exciting musicians around today, be it from Brazil or anywhere else.