Carla Morrison — Amor Supremo (2015)

Out tomorrow.

The lead single is already on my shortlist for picks of the year.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFX6vRrUzMQ

I'm expecting something rather special.

Anticipate and discuss here.

all I know of hers is the Mientras Tú Dormías EP from a few years ago but it's lovely. eager to check this out.

First heard her via the "Eres Tú" video's spread ... apparently a wider sonic palette on the new album. There's a NY Times review but blocked in China and can't find a mirror/cache yet.

The whole thing is already on YouTube in pieces and I listened to about half of it when I broke into tears.

Decided that was enough of that until I will be able to listen to it as a whole.

From what I heard, it's a really pretty record. I mean, even for her.

http://www.npr.org/2015/10/28/450612981/first-listen-carla-morrison-amor-supremo

I like this album

I cried myself to sleep to it last night.

Already my AotY.

Was trying to figure out what the intro to "Tu Atacas" reminded me of, and it's probably the intro of DJ Shadow's "You Can't Go Home Again" :/

Gorgeous, gorgeous album; "Mi Secreto"'s synth palette is bananas.

The positive reception it's getting pleases me greatly.

My Spanish is horrible — but good god, from what I can get, every song is just heart wrenching.

This is like the latin pop Disintegration or something.

I love her so very much.

Even has a little Robert Smith guitar homage on 'Todo Pasa.

Just gets better with every listen.

Yeah, this is sublime; alongside Susanne Sundfør's 10 Love Songs, this has been a good year for getting floored by lexicons of love. Tim F to thread, eh.

I kinda remember her 2012 album and seeing her on some Latin Award show then.

Here's part of the NY Times Ben Ratliff review:

it stays pretty close to one performed tempo (a bit below medium) and one portrayed state of consciousness (lucid dreaming). It’s an hour of reverbed-out ballads about intemperate love and the void.

Her music hasn’t always been this single-minded. Ms. Morrison’s last record, “Déjenme Llorar,” from 2012 — which won Latin Grammy Awards for both alternative album and alternative song — had some immediacy. Its sound and arrangements were more direct, varied and acoustic; it transmitted despair, but could do it in a sweet, genial, small-scale way. Here, with the producer Alejandro Jimenez, she’s gone oceanic.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/05/arts/music/review-in-carla-morrisons-amor-supremo-love-and-the-void.html?_r=0

It is indeed a big left turn for her musically.

But I'm gonna go ahead and say UPGRADE.

My wife likes it...I like it in doses, but for a whole album its too one-dimensional for me. Heavily produced, atmospheric melodrama... Its more Lana Del Ray or something than Julieta Venegas

Yeah, Twin Peaks en espanol. Sounds good though.

Guys, don't talk about things that suck in here, please.

Yeah, this is sublime; alongside Susanne Sundfør's 10 Love Songs, this has been a good year for getting floored by lexicons of love. Tim F to thread, eh.

― etc, Thursday, November 19, 2015 4:54 AM (3 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

So duh I love this!

Not one-dimensional, not relentless in the onslaught sense--more persistently infiltrating (all these little turns, shadings, variations, dynamics I mean) in the overall straight ahead, and the language barrier/difference is so nearly sheer at times, mostly, I think, such an intimately expressive effect (I just know the seemingly simplest words, for all I know it's all overwritten as hell, for those who really speak the language, but doesn't sound that way) Even if it's all basically one song, "fortunately (as Richard C. Walls said about late 70s Van Morrison), it's still a hell of a song."

But if you don't happen to like any given track here, you're probably out of luck re the rest.

(Speaking of ah, Twin Peaks, also check Whitney Rose, Heartbreaker of the Year, produced by Raul Malo, who also sings on it from time to time)

As someone who understands a good lot of Spanish, the lyrics fit the music perfectly.

And after sitting with the album for a couple weeks, I'd venture to say that 'Tú Atacas' is the big standout.

Yeah! Also "Un Beso": strong opener; could def see these two as singles.

I can hear a house remix of 'Cercanía' as well.

Listening more, I do notice a few that seem too dependent on repetitious effects. Another reason to look for mixes. Most of it still seems pretty damn good.

God, 'No Vuelvo Jamas'

Aplastar mi alma Carla.

Yeesh.

"Un Beso" was covered over at the Singles Jukebox, #17 in their EOY rankings:
http://www.thesinglesjukebox.com/?p=19119

Still amazing.

"Vez Primera" music video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B9GiF26kAvo

Gorgeous.

four years later and it's only grown in stature. this is an absolutely heartwrenching masterpiece on the same emotional level as things like hounds of love and pink moon as far as i'm concerned.

She's been trickling new music onto Spotify recently and it's all left me a bit bored and disappointed, unfortunately. However, going back through some of the extras from this album that I missed, the Noyte Remix of 'Vez Primera' is just stellar. Definitely a longtime favorite, and what a great remix.

(Sorry for Spotify link; it's not on YouTube. At least not in the US.)

(Also the "Desnudo" version of Amor Supremo is great, btw, and sounds a lot like her older material. RIYL, I guess.)

Ahh what the heck, here's the "Desnudo" rendition of "No Vuelvo Jámas"—

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPMEpy349BU

Really like her voice on this one. Very blue hearted.💙

okay just first listen to the new record, but SUMMER JAM ALERT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwwgwiS072w

the album has already exceeded my expectations. holy shit.

oh yeah— the new album is called el renacimiento and is out today.

whole thing's really good. amor supremo was obviously going to be difficult to top and while this isn't even in the same league, it's easily a solid follow-up. i think the long gap between proper albums was to her advantage with this one. definitely has a less ethereal sound in the production. highlights carry it, but she's really doing different things with her voice on this album and it seems intentional. maybe a bit cheese at times, but she sounds great.

overall, 3-3.5 mics. "diamantes" <—absolute smash

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/04/27/arts/music/carla-morrison-el-renacimiento.html?campaign_id=53&emc=edit_ms_20220429&instance_id=60049&nl=louder®i_id=37355772&segment_id=90870&te=1&user_id=062566bcd9872d3bfa0c4b1ac1e046b4

“I was on tour and I was hating it,” she said. “And I wanted to make music and I was hating it. And I just had no songs to offer.”

...With Jiménez, she moved from Mexico to Paris in 2019. They passed auditions to enroll at a music conservatory in a Paris suburb, where Morrison studied jazz singing; it was her first formal music education after a decade as an award-winning songwriter. She immersed herself in Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday and, surrounded by fellow musicians, she also eased back into writing songs....

In Paris, working on songs during quarantine isolation, Morrison was ready to change her sound again. “For the longest time, I felt very pressured to keep my guitar close,” she said. “I felt very pressured to be this singer-songwriter, because I know people love that side of me. But I also was like, ‘No! I listen to Adele, to Sam Smith, to Billie Eilish, to Ariana Grande, to Dua Lipa.’ And I was like, ‘I really want to channel that. I just want to go pop. And I don’t want to be afraid.’”

Morrison weathered another bout of depression in 2021 after losing her father to Covid-19.

I need to relisten to Amor Supremo, my love story with Carla Morrison was firmly with the first.
I am not sure I feel the generic r&b / trap production rather than the sparse singer-songwriter approach, but I guess it's discrete enough, more importantly the tunes are there, and her voice is still that soft caress and warm embrace. I can't think of her as a pop artist (yet), but probably this started already on the previous.
On first listen, Diamantes, Mi Ansiedad, Soñar stand out immediately. It's a tired comparison but I imagine Eillish nodding in approval at Obra de Arte. Divino is nice. Nice collection of 11 songs.

new jam with karol g-

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orNpRKOfjzY

"mañana será bonito"

^^^so that's ended up as one of my favorite songs of the year. took until summer to fully go there, but yeah: definitely approved for all audiences.