Bleu de Lune

This Franco-Algerian bunch of latter-day troubadours was discovered busking on the streets of Paris. Their live shows are renowned and their highly eclectic and spirited music inevitably draws comparison with Manu Chao's; they sing of similar themes with a similar compassion and mercurial mix of pan-global musical influences. The original quintet has now become a nine-piece, so it's unsurprising that this, their fourth album, should be certainly bigger and arguably better than ever before. The 12 original and highly poetic songs in the tradition of Brel, Brassens et al range from the exhilarating swing of ‘Mon Ami Mon Frère’ to the sheer beauty of ‘Sa Majésté la Mer’, which tackles the theme of migrants with a distinct Cape Verdean feel. Bandleader and principal singer, Vincent Sanchez, is a convincing and compelling vocalist, while the imaginative arrangements make hay with a heady mix of zouk, soukous, cumbia, bal-musette and much more. The headlong ‘Parasite’, for example, is a riotous mix of Gypsy jazz guitars and Balkan brass. If the bonhomie of ‘Clara’ is a tad overblown, it's an engagingly performed homage, nevertheless, to post-war Parisian Hot Club jazz. All a little mad at times, it's also rather marvellous.