I wasn’t a huge fan of superstar producer Trevor Horn’s previous album along similar lines, Trevor Horn Reimagines The Eighties, but the list of “guest stars” on this album reeled me in anyway – and I discovered I liked this album much, much better.
While there are some ’80s icons participating in this album of covers (is anyone actually capable of not being at least morbidly curious about Rick Astley tackling Yes’ “Owner Of A Lonely Heart”?), including Toyah Wilcox and Soft Cell’s Marc Almond, the guest artists who emerge from further afield really make this album. Sure, hearing familiar ’80s voices cover songs by other associated-with-the-’80s acts is fun, but hearing Seal take Joe Jackson’s “Steppin’ Out” and run with it (with Horn coming dangerously close to turning it into a bossa nova groove), or hearing Iggy Pop do his own thing with Depeche Mode’s “Personal Jesus”, really makes this album for me.
The flip-side of Horn’s recurring theme of covering the ’80s, of course, is that he’s dropping an orchestra on top of most of it (particularly here for his debut on Deutsche Grammophon, a label usually identified with classical recordings) and diluting it down to muzak. And, hey, I get it – those of us who were listening to these songs back when they were brand new and perhaps more innovative are now rocketing through middle age at alarming speed. But if dropping pretty orchestral accompaniment on top of new wave gems isn’t bizarre enough, there’s Tori Amos’ cover of Kendrick Lamar’s “Swimming Pools (Drank)”, which is a walloping dose of cognitive dissonance – a song about a troubling subject is suddenly inordinately ornate.
There’s a lot to like here, but after two albums in a similar vein, Trevor Horn is in danger of becoming his own cover band, and I have mixed feelings about that. Any chance of reconvening The Producers and doing anything new, Trevor?
- Swimming Pools (Drank) (with Tori Amos)
- Steppin’ Out (with Seal)
- Owner Of A Lonely Heart (with Rick Astley)
- Slave To The Rhythm (with Lady Blackbird)
- Love Is A Battlefield (with Marc Almond)
- Personal Jesus (with Iggy Pop & Phoebe Lunny)
- Drive (with Steve Hogarth)
- Relax (with Toyah Willcox & Robert Fripp)
- White Wedding (with Andrea Corr & Jack Lukeman)
- Smells Like Teen Spirit (with Jack Lukeman)
- Avalon
Released by: Deutsche Grammophon
Release date: December 1, 2023
Total running time: 44:26