Cd - Camille

The Age

Saturday April 26, 2008

Michael Dwyer

WHO Camille

WHAT Music Hole (Virgin)

Singing is all about pushing air for French voice artist Camille. It's like she's swimming in the stuff, slapping it around with percussive grunts, pants and pops, floating in drones and shimmering choral passages, slicing it up with precise, muscular strokes of melody. She conjures half a dozen animals from her incredible larynx in Cats and Dogs, a verbal electric guitar solo on Winter's Child, morse code and shortwave oscillations on Waves. Her outrageous virtuosity is plenty entertaining in itself but even the most novel techniques (lip fart synth, water percussion) are in service to powerful songs that playfully bridge gospel, opera, pop, soul and chanson. -- MICHAEL DWYER

© 2008 The Age

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