I don't know much about Moving Pictures, other than that they're "one of Spain's premiere pop/bossa nova groups". I don't know what that means either. I do know that they sound an awful lot like Belle and Sebastian doing Sundays covers, except that only the girl Belle and Sebastian singer is singing, and she's trying her best to sound like the girl from The Sundays. I don't know where the boy B&S singer is. He must be off chewing on his sleeve or something.

This is a short CD; most of the songs are under three minutes long. The first track, I Go Out of Tune, runs only about two minutes, but that's long enough for the super-hyper drums, mellow horns and the singer's peculiar voice to draw you in. At two and a half minutes, Come and Help Me is practically an epic; it's got some of the warmest playing on the disc, which helps take the edge off of the singer's super cute but occasionally slightly shrill voice.

The bossa nova part comes out a bit on songs like "Silence", a happy, bouncy tune with pretty strings, vibraphone, mostly unintelligible lyrics and lots of syncopated rim shots (that's the bossa nova part). "Un Prince Charmant" is, as its title suggests, very charming. Of course it's in French, so the singer may be singing about eating donkeys for all I know, but she sure is making it sound nice! The song has a lively bass part, zippy drums and clever accents from the horn section.

Did i mention that this is nice music? In fact it's so nice and cute that I'm sure that some people will be driven absolutely batty by the tweeness of it all. I happen to be in the mood for some springtime silliness, so for now, Joie de Vivre suits me just fine.