Extraordinary Rendition (Cumbancha)

Rupa & the April Fishes bookend their debut album with brief field recordings—a midday siren, Pacific waves crashing on the shore, transit crowds, a foghorn—from their hometown, San Francisco. In between these markers they take us on a trip to places resonant in singer-songwriter Rupa’s past and heart.

Extraordinary Rendition is a kaleidoscope of roots-based styles and genres, its light refracted through the eyes of a semi-nomadic Indo-American woman who grew up in California, lived in France and India, and has let her imagination run free in Eastern Europe and Argentina. Most of the songs are in French, but that shouldn’t put anyone off. Rupa’s stated intention is for the primary focus to be on the musical colours and textures that she and the seven April Fishes create, rather than her lyrics.

Rupa’s voice is finely-nuanced, supple, and slightly breathy. The mainly-acoustic band features two cellists, two accordionists, and a trumpeter, and their arrangements are excellent, drawing out the essence of the songs with sensitivity and a sense of adventure. The ambiance is circus-like one minute, late-night cantina the next. Paris’s chansonnier and swing jazz traditions are well-represented, and there are strong influences from tango, Rom and Balkan music, and Mexican norteño waltzes and polkas. The songs are unashamedly sentimental but never sappy. With such an impressive first statement Rupa & the April Fishes are clearly a West Coast band to watch.