POP
“Wikkid Lil’ Grrrls”
Esthero
Warner Bros.
Esthero is one curious girl. Like her last full-length album, “Breath From Another,” this record shows her varied influences from Burt Bacharach to Bjork, Gwen Stefani to Nikka Costa. She’s unafraid to veer from a big-band track into a dark trip-hop tunnel, and while that can be an exhilarating ride, it can also grate.
Esthero’s penchant for dance-pop and Latin-tinged trip hop is infectious, and it’s easy to feel her groove. “Junglebook” is pure cotton candy, “Blanket Me in You (Never Is So Soon)” is a Bjork-styled groover, and the title track is a full-on booty-bouncer fighting – successfully – its multiple-personality disorder.
But then she delves into R&B, and much of this album-closing work is unsophisticated and long-winded. “Dragonfly’s Outro” hints at something deeper and more interesting with subtle hip-hop production, but it never truly rocks it. And at 6:26, “My Torture” isn’t so much hers as it is ours.
Esthero plays the Soiled Dove on July 13. Go to soileddove.com.
– Ricardo Baca
AVANT-GARDE
“Be Careful What You Wish For …”
Gabby La La
Prawn Song Records
It’s doubtful this artist – playing sitar, ukulele and toy piano – will find much of a mainstream following. But Gabby La La had the good fortune of collaborating with Les Claypool, the former Primus frontman with a cult following because of his sundry experimental rock projects.
Here Gabby’s aesthetic is odd but impressive. Like Tinkerbell adapting Tom Waits and Cibo Matto, “Twins” and “Butter and Eggs” encourage deeper study of a musician who seems impossible to pigeonhole.
Gabby La La supports Les Claypool on Thursday and Friday at the Fox Theatre in Boulder.
– Elana Ashanti Jefferson
