Matt Amis reports:
At 23 years old, Norwegian pop prodigy Sondre Lerche has toured America with Elvis Costello and appeared on the “Late Night With Conan O’Brien”. We are eagerly awaiting the Stateside release of Lerche’s third full-length, Duper Sessions, a David Lynch-ready excursion into jazz-pop to be released March 21 on Astralwerks. Once again, we are again behind the times– Duper Sessions entered the Norwegian album chart at number four when it was released in February.
Duper Sessions– named for the place it was recorded, Duper Studio in Bergen, Norway, not as a bad pun– features Lerche’s longtime accompanying band, the Faces Down, along with pianist Erik Halvorsen. It includes covers of Cole Porter’s “Night and Day”, Prefab Sprout’s “Nightingales”, and Elvis Costello’s “Human Hands”. Read Lerche’s diary entries on his website to find out how obsessed he is with Elvis Costello. It’s kinda scary
Lerche is already at work on yet another LP slated for 2006 release, but instead of classy and jazzy, this one promises to be a punchy, aggressive rock record. He plans to record in L.A. this spring with producer Tony Hoffer (Belle and Sebastian, Beck) and put the album out in the fall.
I am wise enough to listen
Press Quotes for COSTELLO My Flame Burns Blue:
The latest and most interesting addition to the small club of crossover rockers . . . a true breakthrough recording . . . a fascinating melange of jazz, Latin pop and modernist tonal essays that at times approach the edginess of Bela Bartók or the noirish qualities of hard-boiled detective movies. Indeed, what’s striking about this collection is how well it works as an album, like a formal program of art songs wafting in the alcoholic haze of a smoky, pre-tobaccolawsuit club . . . Indeed, this collection is an almost eerie re-creation of the kind of 1950s nonrock music that seems lost in the mists of time . . . If you’re sick of the same old, “My Flame Burns Blue” is a pretty good way to break out of your rut.
Record Review / T.L. Ponick, The Washington Times / 17 February 2006
German:
Vielleicht ist Elvis Costello der letzte Vertreter der aussterbenden Gattung “musikalisches Universalgenie”: Rock und Pop kann er natürlich, Jazz und Swing plus Easy Listening auch, und selbst in der Klassik hat sich der Brite inzwischen Anerkennung erspielt. Auf dem Livemitschnitt “My Flame Burns Blue” (Deutsche Grammophon) sind alle Facetten von Costellos Talent in erstklassigen Jazz- und Big-Band-Arrangements zu hören.
Record Review / Stern (Hamburg) / 16 March 2006
