Description

It was on a mountainside in Cumbria that the first whispers of Cate Le Bonrsquos fifth studio album poked their buds above the earth. ldquoTherersquos a strange romanticism to going a little bit crazy and playing the piano to yourself and singing into the night,rdquo she says, recounting the year living solitarily in the Lake District which gave way to Reward. By day, ever the polymath, Le Bon painstakingly learnt to make solid wood tables, stools and chairs from scratch by night she looked to a secondhand Meers mdash the first piano she had ever owned mdash for company, ldquowindows closed to absolutely everyonerdquo, and accidentally poured her heart out. The result is an album every bit as stylistically varied, surrealisticallyinclined and tactile as those in the enduring outsiderrsquos back catalogue, but one that is also intensely introspective and profound her most personal to date.This sense of privacy maintained throughout is helped by the various landscapes within whichnbspRewardnbsptook shape Stinson Beach, LA, and Brooklyn via Cardiff and The Lakes. Recording at Panoramic House Stinson Beach, CA, a residential studio on a mountain overlooking the ocean, afforded Le Bon the ability to preserve the remoteness she had captured during the writing ofnbspRewardnbspin Staveley, Lake District.Over this extended period a cast of trusted and loved musicians joined Le Bon, Khouja and fellow coproducer Josiah Steinbrick mdash Stella Mozgawa of Warpaint on drums and percussion Stephen Black aka Sweet Baboo on bass and saxophone and longtime collaborators Huw Evans aka H.Hawkline and Josh Klinghoffer on guitars mdash and were added to the album, ldquoone by one, one on onerdquo. The fact that these collaborators have appeared variously on Le Bonrsquos previous outputs no doubt goes some way to aid the preservation of a signature sound despite a relatively drastic change in approach. Cate Le Bon CD is available for home delivery from Vinyl Records London, only £9