It's generally accepted that actresses shouldn't make albums and singers shouldn't act. See Lindsay Lohan or Mariah Carey if you're not convinced.
***image1***
But then someone like Zooey Deschanel comes along. "No" should be written all over her musical debut. Not only is she an actress, but she's the celebuspawn of an actress and an Academy-Award nominated cinematographer. But then again, some people were born artists. Deschanel is one of those people.
For She & Him, her debut into the music world, Deschanel teamed up with M Ward, the successful singer-songwriter whose five albums have made him an indie rock favorite. The result is a wonderful 13-song album,
Volume One
, which puts Deschanel front and center, while Ward simply slides sweet melodies behind her vocals.
The songs are simple, Dusty Springfield-inspired ditties, complete with an "Oooh" here and a "La la la" there, harmonizing in the background. Deschanel's voice isn't for everyone though. She's got pipes but, like many of the characters she plays in the movies, they're not beautiful in any kind of typical way. That, however, makes it supremely sexy. She ends notes when others would show off that they could hold them, and most of the time she sounds like she's singing to herself.
Ward's contribution to
Volume One
is so subtle that it's not until the eighth track, an acoustic cover of Smokey Robinson's "You Really Got a Hold On Me," that he makes his presence known. Though the duet is beautiful, the album's strongest tracks are the originals written by Deschanel.
Volume One
is the perfect example of the talents of a frustratingly talented woman: She can sing, she can act, she is beautiful and she won't be pigeonholed. Lets just hope she's hard at work on volume two.
(Patricia Sauthoff)
SHE & HIM
Volume One
Merge Records