[review 2004: the best of the year]

This past summer, Leslie Feist painted Toronto red. Her picture seemed to be all over the alternative weeklies for a good month, and it seemed you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing someone mention “Mushaboom.” Her NXNE show at the Mod Club was a big draw, and even though she seemed a bit disappointed, she garnered more reaction from the audience than most Toronto shows I’ve seen�and all for an album of silky, sublime lounge pop. Must be pretty good, then.

What makes this all so interesting is that Let It Die isn’t what you’d call a summer album; circumstances and the fickle attention of the Toronto hipster scene (heard anything about Feist lately?) just made it so. Recorded mostly in Paris with fellow Peaches collaborator Gonzales, Let It Die is a neo-French-pop delight. It’s also a big u-turn for Leslie Feist, whose last album of solo material, 1999’s Monarch, was much closer to Sarah Harmer than Serge Gainsbourg. And while Feist has developed a somewhat-unfortunate flair for the dramatic in the interim, she’s also recorded a fantastic album of nighttime gems.

“One Evening,” “Leisure Suite” and “L’Amour Ne Dure Pas Toujours” form an alluring and seductive suite, showing off Feist’s vocal and songwriting talents at their best. Her cover of “Inside And Out” is another late highlight cut from the same cloth, a song she describes as the last hour before a breakup. But Feist has other gears as well; “Mushaboom” is a gloriously playful pop gem, and probably the first song most people fell in love with. “When I Was A Young Girl” is grittier than the rest of the material, and a nice counterpoint to the soft, hushed tones of its surroundings. Feist’s upbeat rendition of “Secret Heart” brings it all back, though, bursting at the seams with curiosity and wonder.

So Let It Die isn’t a summer album in the traditional sense, but it’s actually a perfect album for those quiet late summer nights. Or any late night, really. Let It Die will make you swoon with its heady mix of confident poise and quiet emotion.