Les Bleu Pelouse • Egyptian Ella

Just occasionally, a piece of music makes you go, “Wait, what?” This was my reaction on first spinning Egyptian Ella by Les Bleu Pelouse. The quatuor québécois (plus special guests) packs a resonator guitar, double bass, washboard, saxophone, clarinet, and harmonica—so far, so standard—plus what sounded to me like a haunted theremin. Checking out the line-up, it listed Mylène St-Amour, player of the scie musicale. A musical scythe? I know my French is somewhat rusty, so I double checked this—a musical saw made slightly more sense. I had heard of musical saws, of course, but never had I come across one in a jazz or blues context—and this album features plenty of both. The third full-length release from Les Bleu Pelouse (it means the blue lawn, if you’re wondering), Egyptian Ella is an eleven-track celebration of spooky blues and downbeat jazz. Think the Mississippi Delta on Hallowe’en, or New Orleans through a haze of liquor and hard drugs—that’s how this Limey imagines it anyway. It sports tunes made famous by Louis Armstrong (“Lawd, You Made the Night too Long”), Victoria Spivey (“Blood Thirsty Blues”), Cab Calloway (“Kickin’ the Gong Around”), and more, skewing heavily towards the minor key and a leisurely tempo, delivered with a growl and in digital high definition. The effect is old-time jazz and blues via Tom Waits, Nick Cave, or C. W. Stone