Autour De Lucie: Autour De Lucie

On paper, there wouldn't appear to be a huge market for soft-edged pop songs sung in some moon-man language—with two exceptions, they're all in French—but Autour De Lucie crafts music that's so pretty and intricately crafted, it deserves to find success even among the most stubbornly unilingual Americans. The band's self-titled North American debut has already received raves and impressive sales in Europe (in slightly different form from 1994's L'Echappee Belle), and with good reason: Valerie Leulliot's softly lilting voice goes just right with these somber, midtempo, mostly acoustic, string-friendly arrangements. When you figure that bands like Cocteau Twins have won a considerable American fan base despite mumbled, indecipherable vocals, there's no reason to believe pop fans won't eventually discover likable, exquisitely performed French-language songs like "L'Accord Parfait," "Ce Que L'On Tait" and the glorious "Les Anomalies."