CD REVIEWs
By Phil Savva  VARIOUS
ARTISTES
80s Movie Hits
The 1980s produced some of the biggest movies ever-made and some of the
catchiest tunes to go with them. 80s Movies Hits is a selection of some
of those great songs from some great (and not so great) movies of the
era.
Pretty much guaranteed to be remembered and recognised by just about everyone
you can recall exactly where you were when they were released.
The annoyingly-catchy electronic synths of Harold Faltemeyer’s Axel
F (Beverley Hills Cop) opens the compilation and there is other electronica
on offer — Jan Hammer’s Crockett’s Theme (Miami Vice)
and Giorgio Moroder’s The Chase (Midnight Express).
Rock icons Iggy Pop and Survivor are represented in the form of Real Wild
One (Pretty Woman) and Eye Of The Tiger (Rocky II) respectively and there
are the annoying ‘dance movie’ tunes from Irene Cara with
Fame from the movie of the same name and What A Feeling from Flashdance
(Jeez did she have a monopoly on the damn tunes or something?).
The ‘teen movie’ is well represented with Simple Minds’
Don’t You Forget About Me (The Breakfast Club) and Yello’s
Oh Yeah (Ferris Bueller’s Day Off).
An eclectic collection to be sure and yet strangely appealing.
VARIOUS ARTISTES
Housework Songs 2
A double-CD collection of 40 easy-listening pop, rock and dance tunes
for... well doing the housework to!
CD1 opens with — perhaps rather bizarrely — Bad Day from Daniel
Powter so things can only get better! The excellent Corinne Bailey Rae’s
Put Your Records On follows and pop poppets Sugababes massive hit Push
The Button and Kylie’s Can’t Get you Out Of My Head rapidly
appear.
The compilation — as with most collections — crosses several
genres and eras and proceeds to take a step back to the 80s with Bananarama’s
Venus, The Bangles’ Walk Like An Egyptian, A-Ha’s Take On
Me and Blondie’s One Way Or Another to name but a few.
Then it’s a little further down memory lane with Franki Valli’s
Big Girls Don’t Cry, Manfred Mann’s Do Wah Diddy and Bruce
Channel’s Hey Baby.
CD2 seems to go the reverse route with the golden oldies opening the playlist.
Labelle’s Lady Marmalade, Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman,
The Foundations’ Baby Now That I Found You to be precise then progressing
through to the 90s and present day with such delights as Alexander O’Neal’s
Criticise, Tina Turner’s Steamy Windows, The Source’s You
Got The Love and Shapeshifters’ Lola’s Theme.
Plenty on offer here with just about something for everyone.
ALI B
Air Breaks
Top DJ Ali B has rocked the capital for the past several years with his
Air club nights and is a frequent visitor to dance festivals around the
world.
Air Breaks is a collection of some of his favourite tracks from his London
residency and while — as with any dance collection — it will
have a niche market it’s a pretty cool collection.
DJ Icey’s Mayday is a great, boisterous trip through electro with
some great synths and bass. Janette Slack & Dogmatix’s Shake
& Pay manages to combine an almost rock rhythm with rap and bass beats
while Hyper’s Body Rok also has a solid bass beat combined with
an infectious synth hook that works well resulting in a great danceflooor
track.
Stanton Warriors are a big name on the circuit but their track Prisoner
is a little disappointing even with the clever use of sampling from The
Prisoner TV series.
Of the rest of the tracks — Bassnectar’s Everybody is a
good, solid basser and Lee Coombs’ Bad Baby Dub trips along at a
pacy beat. Once again it’s a matter of taste.
SOUL AVENGERZ
Sing
ThIS EP is a good introduction to a dancefloor outfit that produces some
lightweight yet soulful house music.
Sing is very reminiscent of the 1990s dance scene and sounds as though
it tips its hat to the likes of Incognito and M People.
Watch out for them — they’ll be big.
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