Timberlake helps Matt Morris get his break
“WHEN EVERYTHING BREAKS OPEN,” Matt Morris (Tennman)
Justin Timberlake is one of the most relevant entertainers under 30, what with his burgeoning film career along with such diversions as his triumphant gigs as host of “Saturday Night Light” and ESPN’s ESPY Awards. Above all, of course, he’s a pop-music impresario — not just a hitmaker himself, but an entrepreneur giving others a lift as a collaborator, guest star and producer.
Matt Morris, who starred with Timberlake in “The All New Mickey Mouse Club” in the early 1990s, is another major beneficiary of Timberlake, who with Charlie Sexton co-produced Morris’ new debut, “When Everything Breaks Open,” which is being released on Timberlake’s own Tennman label.
Morris isn’t merely a charitable cause, however. He maneuvers easily through the arrangements of his able, if disparate, producers and ultimately seizes the spotlight. His voice rises out of the murky electric/electronic brew of infectious opener “Don’t You Dare,” adding an exclamation point to every word of his refrain, “I told you everything.” Morris then settles all the way down into the jazz-textured horns and organ of the subsequent “Money,” cooing like a soothsayer, “It’s greed that’s the killer.”
The dramatic singer is up for anything Timberlake and Sexton throw his way. He’s commanding and nearly angelic in the stately framework of “Bloodline” and “Let It Go.” He flips through vocal acrobatics to upstage the staccato cadence and reggae inflections of “Live,” slides through he loose, improv-feeling jazz of “You Do It for Me” and sends his yearning voice tripping through the stratosphere against the sprawling guitar of “Just Before the Morning.” Morris’ tone also shifts, from the theatrical sneer of “The Un-American” to the beguiling invitation of “Someone to Love You.”
Sure, Morris got a boost from Timberlake. But he isn’t riding anyone’s coattails.
Rating: 4
‘L’Esprit’ shows it’s not the same everywhere
“L’ESPRIT CREOLE,” Cedric Watson et Bijou Creole (Valcour)
In a vast nation dominated by identical chain restaurants, McMansions and big-box stores, it’s easy to forget that the United States also has pockets of unusual culture, such as the Creole of Louisiana.
Singer/accordionist/fiddler Cedric Watson commemorates the blended traditions of French and African people with his new “L’Esprit Creole,” which sounds all the more exotic with its infusions of country and blues plus polyrhythmic-based arrangements.
Yet as sophisticated and quasi-complicated as “L’Esprit Creole” is, the release sounds like a freewheeling, near-spontaneous good time.
Starting with the hydraulic lift of accordion on opening cut “Bijou Creole,” the album is in a perpetual state of life-affirming inflation with brief periods of deflation to vary the tension.
Electric guitar adds to the spirit of “Le Sud de la Louisiane,” which is further amplified by backing vocals that echo the title refrain, and the constant swell, hypnotic rhythm and child-like melody of “Mais La” yields irrepressibly compelling results. Meanwhile, the swirl of expressive fiddles on “J’Suis Parti Au Texas” fuels Watson’s urgent delivery, and a whoosh of percussion and horns energizes “Zydeco Paradise.”
The upbeat charisma that punctuates most of “L’Esprit Creole” is contrasted by a few more easygoing cuts, such as the reggae-tilted, aptly titled “C’Est la Vie,” and the steel-guitar-supported honky-tonk waltz “Cher ’Tit Coeur.”
There are minor fluctuations in consistency and incongruent shifts in momentum from time to time, as well as a bizarre couple of instances (on “Lafayette Lala” and “Bluerunner”) when the rhythm gets stuck in an uncomfortable rut. However, Watson’s invitation to this cultural celebration is hard to turn down.
Rating: 4
Gorgeous oddity: Lauren Hoffman delivers sweet notions
“INTERPLANETARY TRAVELER,” Lauren Hoffman (Lauren Hoffman)
Lauren Hoffman is full of love and understanding, and she lets it all out on “Interplanetary Traveler.”
The singer-songwriter wrote the 10 tracks during a globe-trotting quest for meaning, which resulted in joyful lyrics made all the more endearing by her dulcet, innocent delivery. Plus she was pregnant during the recording, which perhaps augmented the blissful aura.
“Interplanetary Traveler” isn’t ridiculously naive, but Hoffman does border on over-romanticizing life. That and a tendency toward a monochromatic tone are the only noteworthy flaws in this fresh-sounding release.
Recorded in Israel with fellow producer/musician Assaf Ayalon, “Interplanetary Traveler” has a mystical air that elevates it above a potentially hokey strata. Tender acoustic guitar serves as the backbone of many tracks, but percussion, strings and sundry nuance layer in lushness.
Meanwhile, Hoffman’s peaceful, wide-eyed optimism on “The River Takes Me” — featuring lines such as, “Everything I see is your love staring back at me” — and her “Firefly” declaration, “I’m a firefly, making light for you/I’m a bluebird singing, and this is your song” come across as thoughtful in their melodic presentation and artful arrangements, even if they read as saccharine on paper.
Also, there’s an askew vibe of romance literally echoing in the surreal textures of the title track/opening song as the clear-voiced Hoffman calls herself an interplanetary traveler, adding, “When I took the job, I was too young to know ... What it would be like to be a woman in love,” and a gently persuasive rhythm on “Pictures From America” abets her observation to a stranger in an “enemy” land, “Face to face we could be lovers.”
Sometimes “Interplanetary Traveler” is an improbable combination of weirdness and beauty (think Jane Siberry), and that’s exactly what Hoffman needed to cut the effect of so much sugar. Even more of it would have been masterful.
Rating: 3-1/2
© 2010, Knoxville News Sentinel Co.
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