Amazing Records That Sound Incredible: Nara Leao, Coisas do Mundo (Philips, 1969)
Sidney Miller, who arranges all the tracks here in a gorgeous flute-and-harpsichord-heavy 60s baroque pop style, is like the Wes Anderson of post-bossa: his world is at times quirky, cute, and heartbreaking, but everything is always deliberate, sincere, and beautiful. I adore Nara Leao for her strength-defeats-shyness vocal manner, and this is among my favourite of her records. There is a dramatic staginess to many of these songs — a Brecht number appears on side B — but everything is underlined by earnestness, purity, and a love of melody. “La Colombe” takes my breath away when it transitions from Portuguese to French — possibly because the transition is from a language I don’t understand to one I do.
Sonically this is INCREDIBLE — the engineers listed on the back cover, Deraldo José De Oliveira*, Odilon De Azevêdo Borges, are effing geniuses. It doesn’t get better than this for late-60s Philips/Elenco magic. 10/10.