Sometimes as a music writer you get tired of running down all the details on an album. Sometimes you don’t even care where an album comes from or how it got to your desk. Sometimes you just want to sit back and let the music wash over you. It’s a similar feeling to relaxing on a beach after work (not that I’d know; I live in Seattle and our beaches are cold!). You let the little worries (like “I should probably be spending this time searching for the one-sheet that went with this album”) slide away and you just enjoy the beauty of music made by great minds and hearts.

That’s the case with the new release, Mae Carinhosa, from recently deceased Cape Verdean giant Cesaria Evora (she passed in 2011), which I recently got in the mail from the fine folks at PR firm Rock Paper Scissors. Does it matter when these songs were recorded or where they came from? If you’re an Evora completist it might. But I’m not. I’m just the kind of guy that feels like sunshine is washing over my body when I listen to her rich rich vocals. The kind of guy who loves the shaker beat of Cape Verdean music, and wishes she was maybe my grandmother. It’s impossible not to feel your spirit lift when listening to Evora. And that’s the gift this album can bring to you. 53 minutes of spiritual transportation. A queenly voice that sucks sadness out of you. A fleeting desire to run away from it all to a beach on Cape Verde. A phantom sensation of sand and salt. Money can’t buy these sensations. But money can buy music. And music can transport you.