Review: ‘Island Beyond the Stars’ is a love note to hapa haole music

COURTESY BU ROC RECORDS
With “Island Beyond the Stars,” Kapena De Lima reveals his love for the classic hapa haole music of the 1930s, and does it in a bold and beautiful style.

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COURTESY BU ROC RECORDS

With “Island Beyond the Stars,” Kapena De Lima reveals his love for the classic hapa haole music of the 1930s, and does it in a bold and beautiful style.

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“Island Beyond the Stars”

Pena Bu

Bu Roc Records

Kapena De Lima won a Na Hoku Hanohano Award in 2014 with his first solo album, “Cast Your Cares,” a collection of pop remakes and island standards he’d recorded to sell at his club dates in Waikiki. De Lima’s second solo project, recorded under his nickname, Pena Bu, will be a big surprise for island music fans who know him as a member of the group Kapena. Founded by his father, Kelly “Kelly Boy” De Lima, in 1984, the group Kapena plays contemporary pop and local music.

With “Island Beyond the Stars,” De Lima reveals his love for the classic hapa haole music of the 1930s, and does it in a bold and beautiful style. Count “Island Beyond the Stars” as a front-runner for Hoku Award recognition as well.

Every song is an original. Several could easily become island standards. One is the title song, a delightful, new yet old-fashioned ode to the idealized Hawaii of the hapa haole era. Two others are “Tender Whispers” and “The Breeze and I” where De Lima delivers more nostalgic South Seas magic.

For something more contemporary, yet timeless in content, “Things You Do” is a heartfelt tribute to his wife that expresses the feelings many men have for the woman they love.

De Lima shows his kolohe (mischievous, naughty) side with “Mother-in-Love,” where the singer confesses to having such “a thing” for his wife’s mother that he wishes that he was his wife’s stepfather! De Lima performs the song as a breezy comedy, but the lyrics could provoke awkward conversations among people who think they strike too close to home.

However, just like Sunday morning follows Saturday night, songs with upright messages of Christian faith come later. There are two in the digital album formats, one on the limited-edition vinyl album.

De Lima plays almost all the instruments — ukulele, bass, piano, steel guitar and keyboards. Veteran island sideman Rockford “Rocky” Holmes boosts the old-time ambiance with his work on clarinet, and J.D. St. Onge adds percussion.

It all adds up to a marvelous musical milestone in the De Lima’s career.

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