| (out of four) | According to the liner notes, Columbia s new off-shoot label Music With a Twist was founded to identify and develop lesbian, gay, transgender and bisexual artists and to produce albums like this, which have a distinctly gay twist.
I m not sure how or whether the 14 songs on L Tunes accomplish all that, but they definitely arouse a compelling vibe.
The roster here includes plenty of divas known for speaking their hearts and expressing their sexuality, no matter how it s oriented: Tori Amos, Peaches, Fiona Apple, Nina Simone, PJ Harvey, Pink, Kelis, Da Brat.
The rest are lesser-known (unless you traffic a lot in the backroads of MySpace) performers, including a few who are even more in line with the label s mission: the French duo Prototypes, Betty, Johnny Boy and the Cliks, which features Lucas Silveira, a transgendered man.
Despite the diversity among the artists, the music a mix of radio-pop, R B, rock, electro-clash, disco, punk and neo-folk shares a prevailing mood and common trait: the brash and defiant voices of empowered women, both smitten and wounded, who believe love is the answer, but only when it s with the right person.
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