Sunshine Doray

When an album begins with a song called "Anton the Leper," you know for good or ill you're in for something special, and Kate Feeny and Deanne Iovan have indeed come up with something unique for their first album as Sunshine Doray. This album has more to do with classic art song or the edgier side of musical theater than rock & roll — Feeny's rich, dramatic lead vocals and crisp piano playing mesh with Iovan's lovely harmonies and minimal percussion to give these songs a spare but striking backdrop, and Feeny's stories of unpleasant senior citizens, a life lived from childhood to decay in a few minutes, a venomous lover's quarrel, and a woman reveling in glorious solitude are smart and risky stuff, witty and evocative without ever going in the direction you'd expect. (It speaks well of the songs that the covers of Lou Reed's "Perfect Day" and Brecht and Weill's "Alabama Song" fit unobtrusively with the rest of the material.) While there isn't much filling out this album besides Feeny, Iovan, and an occasional horn or second keyboard, Sunshine Doray sounds admirably full and aurally satisfying, with Dave Feeny's elegant production giving the recordings just the right amount of gloss. Anyone expecting this Detroit duo to be another part of the Motor City's garage rock onslaught will be very disappointed, but if you have a taste for arty pop that isn't afraid to wear its intelligence (or its eccentricities) on its sleeve, Sunshine Doray could be just what you've been looking for.