Chantal Chamandy – September/October 2006
Who: Chantal Chamandy
What: exotic pop
Where: Montreal, PQ
To Contact: Steve Levesque or Jennifer Malazarte at Luck Media & Marketing Inc. 8900 Olympic Blvd., Beverly Hills, CA 90211 (310) 860-9170, FAX (310) 860-9171, info@luckmedia.com, www.luckmedia.com, www.chantalchamandy.com.
Lush and exotic, Montreal’s Chantal Chamandy’s “Love Needs You” is one of the best dance/pop albums to come out of Canada. The ethnic flavours (Indian, Middle Eastern, Latin) and her strong beautiful voice give it its uniqueness, as opposed to some of the by-the-book cheesy, mechanical-sounding dance music so often released. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Chamandy self-produced all 14 songs at Caverne Studio in Montreal, where she now lives, and is aided by some two-dozen musicians, who add everything from violins, percussion, trumpet, saxophone, piano and background vocals to carnatic violin, ehru, and tablas. She wrote all the lyrics and co-wrote all the music, mostly with Subir Dev. The lead track “Zindegi” is a sensuous song with a soft undercurrent of percussion, but the second song, “You Want Me” is the one getting all the attention with its Eastern vibe and rock sensibility. The body-shaking song is enjoying club play with a remix done by Brian Rawlings (Cher’s “Believe”) and US airplay at Hot AC. The album was recorded and mixed by Yanik Daunais, except “Nunca Sera Igual” and “Amor de mi Vida” was mixed by Humberto Gattica. Mastering was done at Vlado Meller at Sony Studios in NYC.
