As the years go by, I just can\u2019t believe how many artists are recording covers albums. It seems to have started with Rod Stewart and his never-ending songbook series, which spawned a whole host of his peers delivering new interpretations of old standards. The latest, of course, is Stewart\u2019s old mate one Paul McCartney, who has just dropped an impressive set called Kisses On The Bottom <\/i>on us.\u00a0 It seems though that the trend has moved on to the genre of soul music as again the list of artists attempting these much-loved classics is growing by the day.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Seal added himself to that list a few years ago with 2008\u2019s Soul<\/i>, which I found to be flat and a little schmaltzy. As such, I was never going to purchase this new collection from him (simply titled Soul 2<\/i>) at all.\u00a0 All of that changed about two weeks ago when I was trawling the internet late one night and stumbled upon Seal\u2019s version of the old Rose Royce hit \u201cWishing On A Star,\u201d which blew me away so much that the next day I went out and purchased this disc.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Now, not everything here sounds as good as that song nor does it always work for me, but I have to say it is a huge improvement on Seal\u2019s previous set of covers.\u00a0 Seal has too often sounded like everybody else and not enough like himself.\u00a0 What I mean is the guy has a really beautiful voice, but so much of the time he sounds like he is holding back or trying to fit in the at times questionable material he has delivered.\u00a0 There have been forays into Euro Pop and dance music, as well as a few too many sappy ballads for my liking.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
But as a young man, he was capable of some brilliant things, which he showed with his stunning self-titled debut album way back in 1991.\u00a0 So the most pleasing thing for me when listening to this record is that it sounds like he has allowed himself more freedom to let go and feel the songs out a bit more; also, his vocal performances here are some of his finest ever.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
That version of \u201cWishing On A Star\u201d is epic, and his voice soars over a killer track that far exceeds the original.\u00a0 More standouts come in the form of the sexy \u201cLove T.K.O.\u201d and the beautiful \u201cOoh Baby Baby.\u201d\u00a0 There is a faithful and earnest reading of Al Green\u2019s \u201cLet\u2019s Stay Together\u201d and funky version of \u201cLove Don\u2019t Live Here Anymore,\u201d both of which sound tailor-made for Seal\u2019s voice and he sounds very comfortable singing them.\u00a0 <\/p>\n
Things stay funky with a cool version of \u201cBack Stabbers\u201d and a sweet but slightly watered-down cover of Marvin Gaye\u2019s classic \u201cWhat\u2019s Going On.\u201d\u00a0 Bill Withers\u2019 \u201cLean On Me\u201d is a great song, but maybe this is just one cover too many. I don\u2019t like the arrangement and Seal could have done more with the delivery as well.\u00a0 A couple more sweet moments with \u201cLove Won\u2019t Let Me Wait\u201d and \u201cOh Girl\u201d and we are all done here. <\/p>\n
Soul 2 <\/i>is a nice, charming enough album of covers that breaks no new ground nor convinces me to become a Seal fan, but it was worth every cent for that stunning version of\u00a0 \u201cWishing On A Star.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":30910,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6091],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-42589","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-seal","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42589","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42589"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42589\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42589"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42589"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42589"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}