Review of Le Fil Album by Camille

Camille
Le Fil
Album Review

Camille Le Fil Album

Living in a country that's about as open minded as Roy Chubby Brown as far as music is concerned it's often easy to forget that the rest of Europe has it's fair share of decent music which can't be pushed under the vague descriptive umbrella of "World Music".
Fortunately every now and then an album comes along and undoes those years of misconception the Eurovision song contest has worked so hard to build, in this case French singer Camille's Le Fil.

From the opening La jeune fille aux cheveux blancs Camille sings, shouts, raps, beatbox's, mumbles and spits her way through the albums fifteen tracks, rising up in moments of melodic beauty and descending in to anarchic overdubbed madness. Silly maybe, bizarre for sure, but dull Le Fil certainly is not.

Comparison with Bjork are inevitable, not only due to apparent similarities in their mental conditions but also, like Bjork's latest release Medulla, the album is largely acappella. Underpinning Le Fil ("The Thread") is an umm thread like drone, a single vocal note sustained from start to finish connecting each track and forming the base from which Camille, often single-handedly, builds her complex vocal harmonies with accompaniment appearing rarely in the form of double bass or piano.

In short the title of "truly original" is wholly justifiable for Le Fil and even though pinning down any of Camille's direct influences would be near impossible the albums true forte is its accessibility. Catchy while intricate and chaotic while tuneful it would be just as at home on a music fanatics record deck as it would on commercial radio, if your going to buy one album this year or a thousands make sure you get Le Fil.

Sam Rawlings

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