Feist: The Reminder (Universal)

Leslie Feist, the former indie-rocker from Calgary in Canada (she fronted Broken Social Scene) has created considerable interest recently for her diverse alt.pop sound which also has one foot in the soul camp and the other in a place somewhere between breathy ballads and lo-fi folk-rock.

This time out -- recording in an old house on the periphery of Paris -- she charts a curiously compelling course which manages to be both sophisticated and yet lacking in artifice.

Astute ears will hear chanson alongside the blues, soulful ballads and indie rock, elegant nightclub torch songs and indie-folk, some techno-pop and bouncy soul-jazz . . . and yet it all hangs together because of the clarity and unadorned power of her vocals, not to mention lyrics which can be poetic and esoteric, or alarmingly direct.

Feist has made an album chock full of memorable songs and confidence -- but I suspect the best is yet to come.