A Song a Day
a site about Dina MaccabeeArchive for Dina Maccabee Band
Innocent Words review
By: Jonathan Tuttle
Dina Maccabee
Who Do You Suppose You Are?
(Antephonic)
Dina Maccabee is a classical viola major, but her music is far from being classical. She is quirky, sometimes a daydreamer, and elegant all in one. Picture the subtleness of Aimee Mann with the chaos of Lisa Germano. Maccabee straddles this fine line masterfully by not getting too folky or too obscure with her sound. She has a striking supple voice that wraps around the music like a warm blanket straight out of the dryer.
On her nine-song debut, Maccabee is joined by free-jazz guitarist Tobin Summerfield and together the classically trained girl and the jazz-inspired boy make beautiful folk pop songs together. The songs on Who Do You Suppose You Are? stand on their own…Maccabee’s style bridge the gap of so many genre’s it’s her own sound.
With her intellictual song structures and perfect-pitch vocals, Maccabee has the abilty to pull off the up beat pop sounds on “Hi-Yo” then counter that with the wide open field of “In Your Galaxy.” “Far Away” is a drum-driven song with screeching strings and Maccabee’s soft vocals. She goes the traditional folk route on “Soon We Will All Be Forgotten” and “Like Dew In the Sun.” The album closes with arguable it’s best track –“Build Me a House” with its tambourine keeping time while a ghostly guitar strums in the back with Maccabee’s slow haunting vocals peeking out behind the haze.
Maccabee, who has played alongside everyone from Vienna Teng, Vetiver, Sufjan Stevens, and Wilco, has learned from the musicians she has played with and applied that to an impressive debut album.
