Florence K

If you were to judge Florence K.’s stunning album Bossa Blue by the title and her alluring photo on the cover, you might wrongly lump it in the same electro/lounge category populated by the increasing number of Bebel Gilberto wannabes on the first flight from Rio. But instead of generic computer generated tropical sounds, or even bossa novas for the most part, Bossa Blue is a warm and elegant album that touches many music genres including various Latin and cool jazz sounds, blues and country. It is no small challenge to weave so many worldly sounds into a listenable album, let alone sprinkle them with lyrics in English, French, Italian, Portuguese and Spanish. Many times see changes the language throughout the song and using impeccable accents so that in one song she may sound like a natural Shelby Lynne and the next Françoise Hardy. Not to give her all the credit, Francois K employs phenomenal musicians that could at once be the house band in a Mexican cantina with their spaghetti guitar and sharp horn bursts on single "Las Calles Del Sur,” or a smoky, Southern blues band as on "It’s No Use.” Already having sold over 40,000 copies in Quebec alone having been released there in May, there are but a handful of solo Canadian artists that can touch the depth and eclectic musicianship that Florence K has and make the results so alluring. Remember her name at Juno time.