Consumer Guide Album

Caetano Veloso: A Foreign Sound [Nonesuch, 2004]
The model isn't Rod Stewart except insofar as "Maggie May" would fit on a U.K.-themed follow-up. It's the Willie Nelson of Stardust--songwriting adept as stealth interpreter. Where the Music Row grad reduced verse-chorus-verse chestnuts to chorus-chorus singalongs, the tropicalia intellectual deconstructs American composition. Jaques Morelenbaum is a salty Nelson Riddle, many arrangements highlight rhythm, and some are surprisingly stark. Tackled are two Porters, two Gershwins, two Berlins, two Rodgers, six other standards, and eight rock-era songs of dumbfounding variety. Dylan, Cobain, Byrne, and Wonder we're ready for. Maybe "Love Me Tender." But Paul Anka's "Diana"? Morris Albert's "Feelings"? Plus all 1:30 of DNA's disruptive "Detached," with Arto Lindsay's flailings arranged for symphony orchestra? Flops include Wonder's oddly tuneless "If It's Magic" and the irreparable "Feelings"--only it turns out Albert was from Brazil, and anyway, "Feelings" is followed hard on by an a cappella reading of Cole Porter's "Love for Sale" that indicts all romantic pop except Porter's "So in Love." A-