As she's prone to do every four years or so,
Celine Dion
released a French-language album called
D'Elles
in 2007, her first since 2003's stripped-down, folky
1 Fille & 4 Types
. Sonically,
couldn't be more different than
1 Fille
-- from its soaring majestic ballads to its chilly disco sheen, it's extremely European, with none of the homey trappings of the 2003 record -- but it does share one significant trait: it is also a concept album. This time,
Dion
has hired a bevy of female lyricists from France and Quebec to give this a common thread of songs about women, thereby making this lyrically and musically more cohesive than the glitzy, scattershot 2002 extravaganza
A New Day Has Come
, while being considerably less sentimentally gloppy than 2004's
Miracle: A Celebration of New Life
. In a way, this is
's most ambitious project in a long time, if not ever -- really, the only rival is that musically adventurous
, and if
is a bit too careful musically, it nevertheless is unified as an album and shows some serious artistic ambition, two things her post-stardom English albums are often missing, and always to their detriment. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine