***Īdon Olam is comes from a goyish song I love, Hey There Delilah, and this is a perfect song for acapella - the arrangement is simple and the focus is in the vocals and harmonies. Despite this grudge, the song gets momentum after 3:15 when Avi Stewart storms in with a very good modulation, in addition to the fantastic light choir harmonies in the background (if you don’t know what I’m saying check 3:37, where the choir sound is more perceptible). Their Mi Adir is great and I wouldn’t change that one, but this one deserved better lyrics. The Mi Bon Siach lyrics are probably the least original lyrics for a song these days and considering that song #7 is Mi Adir, which has the same lyrics in the second part, I think the lyrics choice here was bad. Despite this, I absolutely love the vocal improvisation in 4:18 – the vocals towards the end of the song are amazing, it saved this song from falling short. George Harrison had a message and he sang it with more heart than the soloists in this song. ****Īlthough musically Halelu is very interesting I didn’t find any connection between the tune and the lyrics, so the song is somewhat “empty” as it has no message behind it. Tree of Life) is a play with the original title of this song, It's My Life. Btw, the choice of words - Etz Chaim (i.e. I personally don’t enjoy the “guitar voice” in 2:25 as I think it takes away the acapella feel. The arrangement and harmonies are identical to Bon Jovi’s original version but doing all that in an acapella setting really is a great accomplishment. I hoped to see one or two Jewish songs, like in their first two CD’s (Hashem Elokei and Hiney were great), but this time AKAPella focused in non-Jewish sources.Įtz Chaim, composed by Bon Jovi, is a very energetic rock song with lots of computerized effects and it is a great choice for the opening song. The other soloists are also good at it and that alone made this album fun to listen. CD Eichler uses his falsetto very often, tastefully, and he is great at song interpretation – he doesn’t just say the words, he ads intensity to every note. Each vocalist has a different style and they all mesh together very well, not to mention the harmonies, which are almost always smooth and cool. The vocals in this album are exceptional. And the font – a detail usually ignored by most artists - used by the graphical team is also unusual and very cool.
The blue-colored Chameleon with the three-shaped tail is brilliant and I’m happy they dubbed this album Adaptations – it’s an accurate one-word description of what this album is all about. But I decided to post it anyways, as I originally wanted to be done with it before Lag Baomer.Ī.K.APella’s album cover is the nicest I’ve seen in many years, even cooler than Yossi Green’s in my opinion. Anyways, it took me double the time to write this review and I admit it’s still a bit clumsy.
Since I didn’t know all the originals my wife joined in and this review quickly became a family song quiz. I not only had to listen to the songs in this album, I had to go to the original tunes to find out what's novel and what is just copied. I got to be honest, this review has been really challenging for me.