CABARET VILLE MAGAZINE. P197.
CDs REVIEWS.
Ultimate
Collection , Eurythmics (RCA/SonyBMG)
Annie Lennox was always a contradictory pop star, seemingly too smart and unavailable for the full-blown version of what she and Dave Stewart so obviously coveted. Her bitter edge was, fortunately, always balanced by something heated and pleading; and when she sang against the beat in Angel with that big, fierce/needy voice, all was forgiven. Stewart programmed synths as emotionally expressive as big pop ever had, and although personal taste gravitates more to the downtempo (Baby's Coming Back, Here Comes the Rain) than the uptempo (the public-advocacy Sisters Are Doin' It for Themselves), the box score is good.Includes one new song, the synth-gospel I've Got A Life, all the hits, and a couple from the underrated 1999 Peace album. Rating: 4 stars out of five. -Marc Nepage.
The
Body Acoustic, Cyndi Lauper (Epic)
On her new disc The Body Acoustic, 52-year-old Cyndi Lauper recasts a slew of her old hits -- from She Bop to True Colors and Time after Time -- in acoustic form. It's an experiment that could soar or crash. Alanis Morissette released an acoustic version of her breakthrough, best-selling 1995 album Jagged Little Pill to lukewarm reviews just a few months ago. But Lauper -- both slinky and spunky in a bodiced red dress and platinum hair on the album's cover -- has penned or performed some of the most durable tunes to come out of the '80s. And her voice, at once raspy, perky and thrillingly powerful, can still pull emotion out of the deep crevices of those 20-year-old words. The Body Acoustic, while not earth-shattering, shakes up an old formula with new tricks, from Lauper's own dulcimer playing to talented guests. First of all, Lauper co-produced the album with Rick Chertoff, the whizz behind her 1984 Grammy-winning debut She's So Unusual, and William Wittman, who produced 2003's At Last. Quietly unassuming, She Bop -- which was originally a bouncy, naughty hit from Lauper's debut, She's So Unusual -- could fuel a spaghetti western with its dusty dulcimer chords and whistling interlude. Noteworthy songs include Money Changes Everything with Lauper and Taking Back Sunday's Adam Lazzara harmonizing along to a hand-clapped beat. Sarah McLachlan's breathy duet with Lauper on 1984's Time After Time provides good contrast to Ani DiFranco and Vivian Green's inspired yelps on Sister of Avalon. True Colors, from 1986, is frankly beautiful: simplified to acoustic strings and Lauper almost sobbing its theme of love and acceptance. Of course, Lauper wouldn't be who she is without the lasting legacy of 1984's Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. The only purely un-acoustic song on the album, it's a cute but fluffy take on the original with Japanese pop duo Puffy Ami Yumi giggling to a ska-influenced groove. Yeah, girls just wanna have fun, but then so do grown women. Rating: 4 stars out of five. -S. Schou.
Aerial,
Kate Bush (Columbia)
Kate Bush hasn't released an album since 1993's The Red Shoes, and at 47, she's now more soccer mom than chanteuse. But she's still masterful at making spooky, sexy music tinged with strangeness. And this double-CD set should satisfy long-neglected fans. Both discs, A Sea of Honey and A Sky of Honey, are filled with Bush's lush piano-playing, strings, moody electronica, nature sounds and her poetic, if not slightly wacky words.
The first single, King of the Mountain, sounds like the onset of winter itself with synthesized wind blowing and icy computerized blips. The lyrics are about Elvis, the king himself, frolicking "in the snow with Rosebud," a presumed allusion to the sled in Citizen Kane. In Pi, she sings the mathematical equation. And it sounds good. Really -- if you're the kind of fan who loves her operatic voice and wouldn't mind hearing her sing a grocery list or the alphabet. On the second disc, Prologue sounds like soaring movie music with lyrics about "the light in Italy." If King of the Mountain is winter, Sunset is summer. Stripped down, the song is about the words. "This is a song of colour," Bush sings. "Where sands sing in crimson, red and rust/Then climb into bed and turn to dust." It hits a crescendo with Spanish-style guitar and a peppy chorus, "Oh, sing of summer and a sunset." Both CDs are classic Kate -- meant to be played in the dark when you're up too late. Amazingly, her voice hasn't changed dramatically over the years. If anything, the squeakiness of Wuthering Heights and Running Up that Hill, has simply mellowed, leaving behind a more mature, seasoned voice, but no less haunting. Rating: 4 stars out of five.-T. Kurtis.
Confessions
On a Dance Floor. Madonna (Warner)
It's back to the future as Madonna fetishizes the disco ball and rides a deep house beat into the sunrise. This one's for the clubs. She delivers an ode to one of the planet's great clubbing cities, on the sure-to-be-big-in-the-Apple I Love New York. At her best, Madonna lets her voice hang on simple pop hooks. She is at home amid the thumping beats and synth-laden production (courtesy of DJ-producer Stuart Price, aka Les Rhythmes Digitales).
They
lose the plot a bit, eventually, and songs begin to blur. But it's an easy,
fun listen that captures house music's ability to be both festive and
introspective. Party on. Rating: 5 stars out of five-T Dounlevy.