Lisa Papineau

Red Trees (Sargent House)

By Erin Lyndal Martin
Published: June 13th, 2010 | 1:00pm

Led by a voice evocative of Bat for Lashes’ Natasha Khan, Lisa Papineau's Red Trees serves up a warm intimacy including as much acoustic softness as synth-driven percussive numbers. One of beauties of Trees is that the variety of instrumentation and vocal stylings help craft a record as diverse as it is cohesive. "The Language of a Name" features the late entrance of synths, while "Touch Time Out" begins as an instrumental before Papineau and her male vocal counterpart’s operatic "ah"’s send the song out on a soaring climax. The contrasting male vocals are a nice touch, blending together best on album highlight "This Is for the Love (Je T'kiffe)” as they weave among organs and violins.

Another beauty is the tracks alternate between being driven by electronic intrigue and guitar and vox. "Annette Tessier" and "Nancy Baker" both maximize quiet guitar beneath Papineau's sparse vocals, and "Marco Chomo" features the same guitar, but kicks off with echo-chamber vocals, organ, and a tinkly piano. "Rene Thomas" and its reprise (simply titled "A Reprise"), utilize beats that mimic hand claps beneath a flood of "la la la"’s, while "Gay Can't Wait Forever" is an instrumental number full of bleeps and blips.

Altogether, Red Trees is a fully accessible album that provides for diverse, haunting listening.

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Sargent House