It takes courage to go into a studio and play it like you do live and that’s what Listen Lisse has demonstrated with her album “Sunset Over Cairo”. Over the course of these ten songs, she flies the flag of an honest performer and that alone distinguishes her from the dedicated followers of autotuning.
That same honesty also finds itself a home in her lyrics with a distinctly non fluffy approach to life’s trials and tribulations evident. “Bad Wine”, for example is such an edgy song that it could cut itself whilst the bleak wistfulness of “Criminal” – the album’s best song – equally drips blood.
Whilst the doing it live approach is commendable, a one woman band is bound to run into some sonic limitations quite quickly and the lack of variety in the presentation of the songs does make you assume verisimilitude when that is not actually the case. It would be nice to hear some of these songs as full productions. It would indeed.
Available from Bandcamp.