Cirque du Soleil Album: “Ovo”

There are two categories of songs in Ovo - the toe-tapping, cheery tunes, and the chilled, lounge melodies. Berna Ceppas has been praised by reviewers for getting Cirque 'away from the "new age" prison that [it] has been trapped in', but this recording serves more to showcase how restrictive this supposed 'departure' is.

Cirque du Soleil's music typically draws on a number of influences and musical styles. With rare exceptions, Ovo revolves almost entirely around Latin American rhythms, instrumentation and melodies. The result is a fairly mediocre musical experience. While none of the songs on the CD are horrible to listen to, the majority of Ovo is best served as background music. 'Briso do Mar' is a pleasant opening, reminiscent of a relaxed flow of jazz, with lead singer Marie-Claude Marchand's dreamy vocals in Portuguese drifting lazily through the piece. 'Ants' and it's arguable reprise 'Carimba de Creatura' are undeniably catchy tunes, although extremely repetitive, while 'Love Duet' is a welcome moment on the album void of any Brazillian percussion. The highlights of the album are the tranquil and seductive 'Orvalho', which merges a chilled beat with soft interactions of strings and woodwind, and the poppy upbeat theme song 'Banquete', a bouncy love song in 3 different languages.

The rest of the album is fairly pedestrian, with the rest of the compositions never evolving or developing any kind of climax. 'Cocoon', 'Foreigner', 'Flea Girls', 'Sexy Web'...they just don't go anywhere, and the rest of the pieces are repetitive, pointless, or just not engaging in general. The worst song hands down is 'Legs'. Dreadful name, terribly dull, over-repetitive - just embarrassing to the Cirque du Soleil brand. The presentation of the CD is not all that great either. Besides the boring run-of-the-mill song titles, the CD includes names such as 'Sexy Web', 'Legs', and 'Flea Girls', which are awkward and totally inappropriate. 'Secret Samba Luv[sic]' using shorthand is just unacceptable. Who ever decided on these titles should be fired.

In reflection, this is not a good representation of a Cirque du Soleil product. However, it works as a stand-alone album - but it saying that, it's a very mediocre album which is not all that different to the hundreds of other Latin American albums available. The question to consider is, if Cirque du Soleil didn't have its name on this product, would anyone care about it?