Amrat

There is something about discovering one's native tongue after a brief fling abroad with a foreign language. Whether out of homesickness or nostalgia, it has happened to a lot of artists, including Rasha Nahas, a Palestinian singer currently expatriated in Berlin. After her unfortunate English-language foray in Desert, Rasha Nahas has returned to her native Arabic in Amrat, and this can only be a good thing. Perhaps it is just as well that this reviewer doesn't understand the lyrics – at least cringey English doesn't detract from these 12 down-tempo, mellifluous tracks.

This album could have been produced anywhere. Aside from a sound recording from a Berlin subway and some noises of traffic seeping through into a couple of the tracks, rather in the manner of Bowie's Berlin song ‘Sense of Doubt’, there is nothing that suggests a sense of place. Nor is there anything particularly Arabic about the album. The album is a bit neither-fish-nor-fowl. You just have to take it as it is – on its own terms. Maybe the best track is the third one, ‘Habbetek’, which has a low-key Sunday morning kind of vibe to it, with sultry reverb-laden vocals, stray horns and some retro synth-lines going on.