I don't know about you, but when I hear of actors/actresses making albums I just have to cringe a little. David Hasselhoff anyone? Anybody remember Crispin Glover's record? And let's not forget to thank Jennifer Lopez's constant detriment to society shall we? This She & Him project however intrigued me from the word go as soon as I read about it. She being Zooey Deschanel, the actress made famous from being so damn cute in movies like Elf and All The Real Girls (and sister to Emily Deschanel who stars in the TV show Bones. Speaking of Bones The Boneman makes no bones about ZD being his favorite human being)) Now on to Him. His himness would be the one and only M. Ward, fantastic singer/songwriter who's worked furiously with other gal pals such as Jenny Lewis from Rilo Kiley and Norah Jones and who also put out my very favorite record from 2006 titled Post War. Together, these two seem like they'd be a perfect pair, but could it actually work? And then some my friend; because Volume One is one of the biggest and most unexpected surprises so far of the year and will probably go down near the top of my list for 2008.

Volume One has a simple formula in that Deschanel is the voice and Ward the caregiver of music. Deschanel turns out to be quite the surprising vocal talent falling somewhere between torchbearers such as Dusty Springfield and Linda Ronstadt with a knack for songwriting to boot. Ward makes sure that every song has just the right feel to it whether it be Country-Western on the tearjerker "Change Is Hard" or 60's girl-group on the infectious "I Was Made For You." Even the two covers that they come up with to duet together, Smokey Robinson's "You Really Got A Hold On Me" (one of my all time personal favorite songs, period) and a Hawaiian take on The Beatles' "I Should Have Known Better" are aces. The title Volume One leads one to believe that this isn't just a one-off project between these two and hopefully that's the case because I can't wait to see what these two cook up together in the future.