Pitchfork

It's taken two years for the debut album by singer/songwriter José González (Swedish, obv.) to reach these shores, and it's easy to see what nudged it here. González's sparse recordings showcase hushed, double-tracked vocals, haunted imagery, and a clearly gifted classical guitarist. His gripping acoustic cover of countryfolk the Knife's electro-pop "Heartbeats" was even a minor hit in his homeland. An ethereal, sometimes-aloof troubadour, González will sing you to sleep and then dash off under cover of night, leaving only cold-sweat nightmares and an unopened bottle of sweet vermouth.

Yup, two years, and on Veneer, González suggests he'd kinda like to stick around for a few more. Permanence is a pressing concern: With bongos and a hint of bossa nova, "Remain" emphasizes perseverance, while the scant lyrics of handclap-enhanced "Lovestain" complain of the marks you can't just shout out of you heart, maaan. The arrangements are full of Nick Drake-style open tunings ("Stay in the Shade", in particular, can't escape the shadow of that introvert-folk patron saint) and only a forlorn trumpet on closer "Broken Arrow" disrupting the guit/vox/maybe-tasteful-percussion train to Starbucks-comp paydirt.

As with like-minded songstress Emiliana Torrini, González is at his best when he forces a personality onto his faceless raw materials. The distinctive finger-picking on "Crosses", the best original song on the disc, rises like the spires of a Gothic cathedral, giving form to lyrics about a redemptive light in the darkness (any religious inferences, meanwhile, are left entirely to the listener). By comparison, sotto voce opener "Slow Moves" tries a little too hard to sound like its quiet-is-the-new-loud forebears, with a meta-chorus too wispy to hold tight 'til morning: "My moves are slow/ But soon they'll know".

González's aforementioned "Heartbeats" cover is nearly as spine-tingling as the original, if not its frenetic Rex the Dog remix. Echoing M. Ward's "Let's Dance", Iron & Wine's "Such Great Heights", and Frente!'s "Bizarre Love Triangle", González strips the electro-pop down to an acoustic lullaby, laying bare a powerful melody and deceptively evocative lyrics about love, regret and nostalgia. González has also covered Kylie Minogue's "Hand on Your Heart", and the gulf that remains between these must-hears and his self-composed material is significant. González knows a great song when he hears it, and he plays a mean guitar, but in 2003 he was still more raw than the overseas buzz suggested; Veneer is nice, but it may just scratch the surface.

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