Brazzaville - Rouge On Pockmarked Cheeks CD

Rouge On Pockmarked Cheeks songs Slick bossa nova rhythms and exotic lounge stylings fuse in the hip, world-influenced indie pop of Brazzaville. While the music is reassuring and enveloping like the lapping waves of a tropical beach, listen closely to the lyrics lying just under the surface of the saxophone-led music and you hear sad, if poetic, tales of broken lives: hobos, drug addicts, and more. This contrast adds dimension to the already very sophisticated jazz-inflected topical alt-pop. ~ Tom Schulte "dark, sophisticated pop from one of L.A.'s most accomplished new bands. Think of Brazzaville as vagabond pop for fans of Morphine, Tom Waits, Spain, Leonard Cohen and Tindersticks."--Neil Strauss, New York Times "Brazzaville is one of the hippest and most exiting experiments to come down the pike in a long, long time...few are able to articulate the dizzying, dislocating changes of 21st century globalism quite as eloquently as Brown. Brazzaville is an intuitive, impressionistic take on our shrinking world where themes of isolation and loneliness are at odds with the promise and allure of easy international transit."--Tom Pryor, Senior Editor, CDNOW "The disc is an absolute delight. Imagine a grainy, low thrum somewhere between the late Morphine and post-Asylum Tom Waits, with an aggressively po-mo dispassion for tossing in various world musics: a little samba here, some Far East exotica, a fado feel- whatever Brown's muse dictates."--Jackson Griffith, PULSE "cinematic mood music with seamless layering - an album of quiet and precise details"--Steve Klinge, CMJ "The seven-piece outfit creates a musty noir Tropicalia with mysterious rhythms and shadings, like a humid back alley cafe in some faraway land where the ceiling fan moves too slowly, perspiration drips down the walls and one false move can be your last."--Erik Himmelsbach, LA WEEKLY "Their music evokes grit, fluorescent lights, and linoleum floors. food stands and back rooms around the world in the middle of the night (I keep thinking of Wong Kar Wai movies). It's weird, I listened to the CD once and dismissed it, then realized one song had wormed it's way into my head and stayed there for two weeks straight. It grows like kudzu and bamboo all at once, and now I love the whole damn thing."--Robin E. , OTHERMUSIC "Brazzaville boasts slinky, spy at the beach sounds that suggest exotic, tropical vacations courtesy of the Federal Witness Protection Program and an invitation into dangerously cool, Yakuza hangouts where nobody knows your name until all the doors are locked. one of those rare albums that more than fulfills its promise." (4. 5 out of 5 stars)--Tom "Tearaway" Schulte, Carbon 14 "This is a great CD. unique and unusual."--JB, HECKLER 4 1/2 stars--Melody Maker "The music sounds old, as if it's spitting out of a transistor in an empty third-world airport in 1967."--Nicole Darling, GLUE Brazzaville includes: David Brown (vocals, guitar, alto & tenor saxophones, organ); Kenny Lyon (guitar, bass); Michael Rozon (drums). Personnel: David Brown (vocals, guitar, alto saxophone, tenor saxophone, organ); Joel Virgil Vierset (vocals, drums); Glenys Rogers (vocals); Smokey Hormel (guitar, mandolin, ukulele); Phil Chen, Kenny Lyon (guitar); Mick Bolger (accordion, trumpet); David Ralicke (trombone); Mike Boito (piano, Fender Rhodes piano, organ); Greco Rossetti (keyboards, programming); Joe Zimmerman ...