Ibeyi didn’t particularly want to make an album about love. “I was really pissed about it at first,” Lisa-Kaindé told Gigwise last year. “Because, when you’re writing and the only thing you write about is love, you feel like ‘Gosh, but I’m an idiot!’” But write about love they have, and idiots they certainly are not.
The debut, self-titled album from twin sisters Naomi and Lisa-Kaindé Diaz (Ibeyi is Yoruban for Twins) is an elegant and eclectic first offering. Their songs showcase hints of the youthful and exuberant 19-year-olds they are in person, but layered beneath a deeply mature cultural medley. Having grown up in Paris in a Cuban family with West African heritage, it’s hardly surprising that they draw together soul, jazz, funk and Yoruban influences so effortlessly.
The album opens with intro track, ‘Elleggua’, whose Yoruban harmonies conjure up the discordant beauty of a church organ. This is carried more explicitly into ‘Oya’, a haunting, multi-layered chant which, despite the sisters insisting their music is not religious, seems possessed by a sort of religious fervour - “Take me, Oya”, the refrain repeats pleadingly. In fact, this fascination with the imagery of spirits and souls is littered throughout. In many cases though, it seems to represent something more carnal. “Let me baptise my soul with the help of your water”, they sing in ‘River’.
Though each track in itself is astonishingly varied, there are times when the album as a whole threatens to become a little formulaic. ‘Weatherman’, for instance, sticks to the same basic principle as many of its predecessors, but with less impact. ‘Think Of You’ is a little more ambitious, with its rich vocal samples and more overt electronica, but it’s disjointed, and the refrain becomes worn out well before the song is over.
These are the exception, though, and not the rule of Ibeyi’s accomplished debut. Standout tracks ‘Mama Says’ and the truly exceptional ‘Ghosts’ carry the album way beyond the many influences from which it draws, and into pastures fresh and new.
At the very end of the self-titled outro track, we briefly hear Ibeyi applauding themselves enthusiastically. They won’t need to do that for much longer – their audiences will be doing it for them.
