Prize (album)
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| Prize | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
.jpg) | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 1999 | |||
| Label | Righteous Babe[1] | |||
| Producer | Arto Lindsay, Melvin Gibbs, Andres Levin | |||
| Arto Lindsay chronology | ||||
| ||||
Prize is an album by the American musician Arto Lindsay, released in 1999.[2][3] Lindsay considered it an attempt at pop music; it is one of a number of his solo albums inspired by the Brazilian music he heard while growing up in the country.[4][5][6]
The album was produced by Lindsay, Melvin Gibbs, and Andres Levin. It was recorded in Bahia and New York.[7] Five of the songs are sung in Portuguese.[8] Vinicius Cantuaria and Skoota Warner contributed to the album; Beans rapped on "Prefeelings".[9][10][11]
Critical reception
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |   [12] |
| Robert Christgau | A−[13] |
| The Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [14] |
| Los Angeles Times |  [11] |
| Orange County Register | A−[1] |
| Orlando Sentinel | [15] |
Robert Christgau stated that the songs float by "on the sinuous current and spring-fed babble of a Brazilian groove bent, folded, spindled, and mutilated by the latest avant-dance fads and electronic developments."[13] The Riverfront Times wrote: "Sensuous and ripe, exotic and incandescent, Prize pulsates along rhythms whose headwaters are found in the airy heights of Brazilian tropicalia jazz."[8] Newsday thought that "the disc has the soft, understated swing of bossa nova—even Lindsay's occasionally skronk guitar doesn't much disturb its romantic patina."[16]
The Los Angeles Times noted that "this master alchemist likes to offset his love of lush, tropical music with sharp, modernist accents."[11] The Orlando Sentinel determined that "Lindsay's slightly out-of-focus singing has a dreamy gentleness that helps unite the strikingly disparate elements on Prize ... the bossa nova and samba prove perfectly compatible with elements of avant-electronica and obstreperous art-rock."[15] The Independent listed Prize as one of the 15 best pop albums of 1999.[17]
AllMusic wrote that "the drum'n'bass textures that lay on the surface of his last album like laminate are more fully integrated this time out: 'Prefeelings' combines a fractured breakbeat with salsa-fied acoustic guitar and saxophones."[12]
