Sally Seltmann - Heart That's Pounding Review

Australian chanteuse Sally Seltmann may be the best-known singer/songwriter you've never heard of. Though Heart That’s Pounding is the first collection she's released under her own name (she was born Sally Russell, but took the surname of the Avalanches' Darren Seltmann when they married), she created two albums, 2005's Last Beautiful Day and 2007's Somewhere, Anywhere, as New Buffalo for Arts & Crafts. She also co-wrote a little song called "1234" that she gave to her friend and labelmate Feist. Through "1234" and her own work, Seltmann has helped architect a specific strain of MOR indie-- slightly quirky songs with perky chamber arrangements or glitchy electronic shading to add depth to its acoustic backbone. By finally dropping New Buffalo in favor of her own name, she is possibly leading with her songwriting credits more than her previous records

Seltmann isn't a powerful singer, but her breathy, dainty voice is well-matched to slight, shivery melodies bulked up with silvery synths or swooning piano. Album opener "Harmony to My Heartbeat" fills the space between her spare, calliope-like melodies with peppy handclaps and a foundation of programmed-raindrop percussion. It's sparse twitchiness recalls bedroom electro-pop, but with sunnier, more expansive aims. But it's hard to walk the tightrope between hushed, poignant, electro-inflected pop ballads and mawkish lite-FM fodder, and Seltmann's songs can have trouble maintaining that balancing act. "The Truth" errs on the side of over-sentimentality with its gooey Karen Carpenter vocals. And on "Over the Borderline" Seltmann tries her hand at the kind of uplifting, this-is-a-new-day anthem that the Polyphonic Spree usually traffic in, and her bald-faced optimism is difficult to take with a straight face....full text Australian singer/songwriter Sally Seltmann has been working for a while under the alias New Buffalo. While she has done pretty well for herself under that moniker, making records that included appearances by the likes of Beth Orton and The Dirty Three’s Jim White, she ultimately entered into a collaboration that changed everything. Seltmann co-wrote “1234,” the ubiquitous hit that pushed Feist to star status, and in the wake of that success, she’s seemingly been emboldened to finally make an album under her own name. While Heart That’s Pounding will certainly not alienate any Feist fans, it’s far from 12 tracks’ worth of “1234 Part Two.” Yes, Seltmann’s voice bears a sweet, winsome tone, but instead of a wan, whispery quality à la you-know-who, it has a bright, welcoming feel that glides invitingly through her elegantly arcing melodies. If anything, there’s a bit of a Belle and Sebastian vibe to some of Seltmann’s tunes. On such tracks as “Dream About Changing” and “Harmony To My Heartbeat,” she adds a ’60s touch to her pure-pop vision, with perky hooks and handclap-laden beats leading the way. Of course, there are more introspective cuts here too; maybe Heart That’s Pounding could be most easily described as the sound of B&S buddies Camera Obscura gone balladeering....full text No longer recording under the name New Buffalo, Australian singer-songwriter Sally Seltmann refreshes her sound on her third album, Heart That’s Pounding, perhaps trying to build on the momentum of “1234,” the Feist hit she co-wrote. Unlike New Buffalo’s stripped-down, at times downright bleak second album, Somewhere Anywhere, Heart That’s Pounding is largely upbeat, with an up-and-at-’em attitude exemplified by the shamelessly catchy “On The Borderline” and the yes-we-can exhortation “Dream About Changing.” A cynical sort might suggest that Seltmann is attempting to cash in here, dulling her edges while playing to the lucrative “don’t worry, be happy” market. But Seltmann has been plenty peppy before, and her music is no less sophisticated as it jumps from the muted Phil Spector-esque orchestrations of the opening track, “Harmony To My Heartbeat,” to the two-note minimalism of “I Tossed A Coin” and the slow-building Broadway-style showstopper “Book Song.” So yes, Seltmann ends Heart That’s Pounding with the reassuring “Dark Blue Angel,” in which she tells the title character, “I will never let you in.” Nothing wrong with a little hard-won optimism, is there?...full text