(Sista)
Herald rating: * * *
Review: Graham Reid
This occasionally exquisite album should come as no surprise as Auckland-Samoan Lole won most promising vocalist at the Music Awards in 97.
A recent convert to Christianity, she brings full bodied gospel (E lou Tamae) and testaments of her faith into the same mix
as pop R&B, the symphonic swell of Vii O Samoa, and the contributions by keyboard player Mark DeClive-Lowe, bassist Max Stowers and DJ Manuel Bundy on the title track.
The somewhat mundane radio interview interludes, while worthy and doubtless important as they advance ideas of Lole's beliefs and the need for Samoan-New Zealanders to hold fast to their culture, come as fast-forward interruptions on an album otherwise long on soul and sensibility.
Singing largely in Samoan, Lole possesses that rare purity of undiluted emotion and in the soulfully poppy Now I'm Free which is underpinned by acoustic guitars and the gentle, soul-sista remix of Lou Sei Oriana she could just have unexpected soundtrack singles to summer on any radio station prepared to look beyond imported R&B.
Promise fulfilled we might say.
