Home > Orlando Music > CD Review > Carla Bruni, 'No Promises'

Backstory: A former model and rock legend dater (Clapton and Jagger), Bruni is anything but a pretty face with a dark, husky voice (so hot!). Unlike, say, Scarlett Johansson’s slap-dash career, this Italian-born songstress has been performing for years, singing in both Italian and French while selling nearly two million albums worldwide. Oh yeah, and she’s currently the first lady of France, having wed President Nicolas Sarkozy earlier this month.

Why you should care: “No Promises” is not an album full of cheeky appraisals of squeaking springs with former paramours like Donald Trump (?!?!). To Bruni’s credit, the concept is fresh, in a dead poet sorta way—she has taken classic works from Emily Dickinson, William Yeats and Dorothy Parker and sings the couplets with beautifully spare and breathy tones.
    
Verdict: Whether you’re following along in your dusty “Norton Anthology” or have popped the album on for dinner party ambience, closing track “At Last the Secret is Out” stands out, as Bruni sings W.H. Auden in her deep, European-kissed accent. The song, about the truth behind façades, appears to be extra meaningful for a singer who may hold a couple of dirty little secrets herself. Yeats’ “Those Dancing Days Are Gone” is interpreted with a jazzy acoustic lick, with the singer lounging through harmonies like the oft-compared Norah Jones. OK, so this is total Starbucks material and not for the tragically hip. But hats off to Bruni for making boring poetry and a boring genre a little more interesting.      

X-Factor: Bruni started reading English poetry as a way of improving her vocabulary, re-reading Shakespeare sonnets before bed every night.

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