SAMBA DE MONALISA - TETINE VS SOPHIE CALLE

From a listener ___ "I bought this when the late lamented Tower Records in London had an electronica section and I was looking for a new genre to get into. I recognised Sophie Calle's name and trusted that whatever this was, it would be worth the effort. Tetine are a Sao Paulo electronica duo, Eliete Mejorado (keyboards + sample + vocals + piano) and Bruno Verner(programming + keyboards + vocals + guitar + bass + piano), formed in 1995. The collaboration is a unique hip-hop-y, chillout-y classic piece of electronica they still perform live. The first half is a fragmented narrative about a disorganised road trip taken by a French woman and American man who first met in a bar: they visit a crank inventor, who turns out to be just like the man's father; they get a quickie marriage in Las Vegas - the official's tone and questions are splendidly bureaucratic; the car breaks down and takes an age to get fixed. And yet the couple are going through motions and maybe don't even love each other. The voices never interact, each is an isolated narrative. The second half is a collection of spacey and luxurious instrumentals, music for that nostalgic, sad, memorial mood which the random recall of a past love affair can bring on".