Musically speaking, Portuguese singer-songwriter and poet Lula Pena has always been an anachronism in the modern fado-scene, and personally she still prefers to describe herself as an existentialist musician. Thus far Pena's output has been limited, making 'Archivo Pittoresco' only Lula's third album since her 1998 debut 'Phados'. Only accompanied by her acoustic guitar, apart from fado (or "phado" as Pena prefers to spell it), on this album she also explores morna, bossa nova, flamenco, American folk and more, taking the listener on a time journey starting in the twenty-first century ('Rose', a song by Brazilian composer Ederaldo Gentil, who passed away last year, or 'Pesadelo Da Historia', based on a poem by Brazilian poet Ronaldo Augusto), travelling back to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries ('Ojos Si Quereis Vivir'), and ending up somewhere in the middle ages ('Cantiga De Amigo'), all the while alternating between Portuguese, French (opener 'Poema/Poème', for which Lula used a surreal poem by Belgian poet Louis Scutenaire), English, Spanish ('Ausencia', a song by Chilean icon Violeta Parra), Greek ('Pes Mou Mia Lexi', written by famous Greek composer Manos Hadjidakis) and even Sardinian ('A Diosa'). Absolute must for poetic souls.