Singer/songwriter
Sara Lee does, like her debut album's title might indicate, have a beautiful voice. Her breathy singing smoothes itself over this recording like a pool of warm milk, creating a sense of peace and comfort that is very inviting. On many songs, the environment that she creates with the fullness of her voice is sufficient to carry the listener; on others the weaker aspects of the album manage to shine through. The title track "Make It Beautiful" is an ethereal soup of wah-wah pedals and surreal lyrics, while "I'll Wait for You" sounds like a bad copy of the remix of
Suzanne Vega's "Tom's Diner" done by DNA -- the spare, slow drum machine beats only chop through the stream of Lee's vocals. The rest of the album seems to follow the same pattern, with the continual excellence of Lee's voice sometimes not adequately supported by the songwriting or instrumentation, but overall her singing is strong enough to carry itself. ~ Stacia Proefrock