See more"Poison Sweet Madeira is a record that defies categorisation as classical influences collide gloriously with world music flavours drawn from Russia, eastern Europe, north Africa, gypsy music, tango and klezmer to create a vibrant musical portrait of one of the most adventurous artists of our time.
Produced by Kevin Bacon and Jonathan Quarmby (Finley Quaye/Oi Va Voi/Ben Taylor) and Marius de Vries (Madonna/Bjork/David Gray and a host of films such as Moulin Rouge), three tracks have guest vocals. ‘A Light That Never Dies’ finds actor and fellow Russophile Ralph Fiennes lending his voice to words based on a poem by Russian Symbolist Alexander Blok. ‘Burnt By The Sun’, sung by Richard Hawley, ex Pulp and Longpigs guitarist and now one of the most talked about artists of 2005, is "based on Stalin's favourite tango and is the first thing I learned to play on the accordion," Sophie says. ‘Lazarus’, which features the voice of KT Tunstall, has a dark ambiguous lyric about "a knock-on the door in the middle of the night."
Poison Sweet Madeira looks set to establish Sophie Solomon as one of the brightest new musical talents of 2006."