Arto Lindsay, Prize (Righteous Babe)
With his fourth album to explore bossa-nova and its variations, one might suspect Arto Lindsay is at a creative plateau. But with the only higher plateaus found in upper Mongolia, that isn't a bad place to be. While broadening the variety of instruments and recording techniques, Lindsay keeps his eyes on the prize (har!) and focuses the music tighter than a duck's butt. While drum 'n' bass rhythms were sprinkled on his last couple albums like salt and pepper, Prize tattoos the breakbeats into its luminous, cool pale skin. While it lacks any surprising covers of Prince or Al Green, the album manages to build upon the classic bossa-nova songwriting mastery of Lindsay's Brazillian predecessors Caetano Veloso and Vinicius Cantuaria and actually surpass their current albums. Underneath the near-perfect songs is a lot of tension. His ace band simmers with Melvin Gibbs' spare funk bass, and a slew of acoustic percussion by Davi Moraes, until Lindsay's jagged electric guitar sputters and breaks the surface for a while to remind you that he used to be one prickly downtown cat in the no-wave days. But soon all you hear is his dry, laconic tenor exuding the warm sensuality that is his personal brand of 90s bossa-nova, and remember the sparks as a half-forgotten bump in the dream.
