Stream Sumie's Beautiful Debut Album In Full
Enjoy brittle, minimal goosebumpers by Sweden-based sister of Little Dragon singer.
REVIEWED ENTHUSIASTICALLY in the new MOJO magazine, the debut album by Sandra Sumie Nagano is a sensationally spine-tingling collection of intimate moments, breathily rendered to a minimal backdrop of acoustic guitar and subtle additions co-ordinated by another MOJO favourite, German pianist-composer Nils Frahm.
The effect could hardly be further from that pursued by Sumie’s younger sister, Yukimi, who fronts electro-pop outfit Little Dragon.
“It was not a style or a sudden choice but more me playing my guitar and having two small children so I could not make much noise,” explains Sumie of her sparse, acoustic approach. “But I also love minimal and delicate music, so that felt like a natural direction for me.”
Entitled Sumie and emerging on December 2 on the Bella Union label, the album ensnared MOJO’s reviewer Kieron Tyler – always with one ear open for new and intriguing female voices from around the world – who gave it 4 out of a possible 5 stars. “This is a baroque missive from a lone soul,” he writes, “a remarkable, wonderful calling card.”
Now you can hear what got him so excited…
Dig the aptness of Tyler’s telling comparison with ’70s chanteuse Sibylle Baier? This is certainly magical, elemental music – qualities underlined by an animated video made by Sumie’s father Yasuke Nagano for the album highlight Never Wanted To Be, where images of snow, water and trees intercut with a glowing pyramid. Consider us fully transported…
Sumie, by Sumie is out on December 2, 2013.