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UK
Release Date: |
8
August 2005 |
Track
Listing: |
1. Put A Little Love In Your Heart
2. Baby I Need Your Loving
3. I Thank You
4. Try A Little Tenderness
5. I Can't Turn You Loose
6. You're No Good
7. The Shoop Shoop Song (It's In His Kiss)
8. You Send Me
9. Go Now
10. Just One Look
11. Gateway To Heaven
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Lulu
- A Little Soul in Your Heart (Universal)
Published:
musicOMH,
August 2005
Original
article:
http://www.musicomh.com/albums/lulu-2_0805.htm
Born
Marie Lawrie in 1948, Lulu first shot to stardom with her
band The Luvvers in the mid-'60s with the joyfully perky
Shout and she has not looked back since, her career going
from strength to strength.
Or
so her record company would probably tell you. The truth
is Lulu managed to hit a paltry number 7 with an old Isley
Brothers cover that everyone remembers for the
first four wailed seconds, moved on to the nonsensical Eurovision
inanity of Boom Bang-A-Bang and only finally managed to
hit the elusive number 1 spot in 1993 by borrowing the huge
fanbase from boyband of the moment Take That.
She is now using her cholesterol to promote this, her latest
album, via a series of TV adverts.
Okay,
so perhaps this is an overly harsh assessment. Nobody spends
over 40 years in showbiz without hard work or talent. But
sit through A Little Soul In Your Heart and try to find
something balanced, objective and, well, positive to say
about the album or the people responsible for it. Elton
John's last album Peachtree Road was a return to
form in many respects, so how as Executive Producer he can
allow this collection of tiresome covers to leave the studio
is staggering. Simon Climie may have enjoyed
an '80s hit or two but as producer, he is just as guilty
as Sir Elton - this is excruciatingly cack-handed musical
homicide.
Imagine
Put A Little Love In Your Heart without any heart or Try
A Little Tenderness with Otis Redding's
raw, heartfelt soul replaced with faux emotion and an empty
squawk and you can begin to imagine just how horrific this
album really is. Add to this similarly vapid covers of Baby
I Need Your Loving and You're No Good, or Your No Good as
the cover mis-spells it (similar levels of attention to
detail were obviously paid to both music and packaging),
and you may be forgiven for thinking things can surely get
no worse. But then the coup de grâce comes in the
form of a cover of The Shoop Shoop Song. Now there is surely
no need in the world for that. How could anyone stoop so
low? Lulu does triumph in one respect, however - it somehow
manages to be even worse than Cher's sugar-choked
version.
When
The Moody Blues' Go Now is carelessly crucified,
you find yourself wishing the Scottish star will do just
that, but, alas, we are 'treated' to a reggae touched version
of The Hollies' Just One Look and a debatably
termed 'Bonus Track' in the form of Gateway To Heaven.
This
is music designed for those whose sense of excitement over
music has long flown the nest and would ideally suit out-of-time
clapping from a heavily tranquilised, Saturday night TV
show studio audience. If you would like to have the word
'bland' redefined for you, then give this collection a listen.
But if you have a little soul in your heart, or anywhere
else in your body for that matter, please, please do not
buy this flat, uninspired album.
-
Ian Roullier |