Daniel Lavoie and Laurent Guardo, La Licorne Captive

Avant pop? Cabaret and world fusion? Daniel Lavoie and Laurent Guardo's La Licorne Captive (Le Chant du Monde) defies categorization. Their album presents a musical meditation, all about the captive unicorn and ages gone by. Canadian Daniel Lavoie presides on expressive post-rock vocals; Laurent Guardo provides the unforgettable music and the arrangements, which are a rather exceptional combination of acoustic guitar, lute, viola d'amore and baroque violon and alto, violas de gambe, tabla, frame drums, dobro, bass and soprano.

It has a mythical, once-upon-a-time sound of a world long lost to us, which is totally fitting to the mythical subject matter--middle ages meets mideast meets French folk meets we the listeners. It took me a few listens to get into the beauty of it all, because it is one-of-a-kind.

But then I woke up to its excellence. If you open yourself up, too, to this one, you may be amazed. One of those rare events--the truly unexpected!