Following their previous recordings together, Changing Faces (2007) and A Different Porgy and Another Bess (2012), David Linx and the Brussels Jazz Orchestra join forces once again to produce this outstanding Jacques Brel songbook. It’s not often you can state that each song on an album is a classic in its own right, but such is the case here. Brilliantly arranged by members of the orchestra, the album’s lead-off track, ‘Quand on n’a que l’amour’ (Brel’s breakthrough song released in 1956), detonates a huge emotional charge which resonates throughout the recording. From the impassioned ‘La chanson des vieux amants’ and deeply swinging ‘Vesoul – Amsterdam’, to Brel’s beautiful homage to West Flanders, ‘Le play pays’, and the tongue-twisting ‘La valse a mille temps’, the dynamic between Linx and the Brussels Jazz Orchestra is viscerally exciting. As a Belgian living in Paris, mirroring Brel’s own artistic journey, Linx is clearly in love with this material, singing with enormous passion and squeezing the bitter-sweetness out of every note.