Sade's Promise is proof that any genre has decent music floating around somewhere. From my vast musical readings, I infer that this eponymous singer is the mother of adult contemporary. And indeed, Promise has that familiar sound of late nights with Delilah on the radio down pat. Smooth saxophones, quiet arrangements with quiet drums, this is all music designed for a certain audience which I normally can't identify with.
Still, I can't deny that this record has Phil Collins beat any way you look at it. The music is classy and professional rather than sappy and generic. Sade is one of those singers like Nico from the Velvet Underground who is intentionally rather non-emotive - in this context, smooth (operator); but to my ears, that gives the whole project much more street cred. She lets the natural timbres of her voice stand out. The saxophone playing of Stuart Matthewman is actually good and there are some fine bass lines to be found as well. Plus, opening track "Isn't It a Crime" is downright great, perhaps because it makes so much use of dynamics and hooks that it can hardly be called adult contemporary.
The downside of this record is that although it all sounds good and consistently conjures up that late-night smoky atmosphere, most of the songs are lacking in vocal hooks and go on for five minutes or more even though all the musical themes are established in the first three. So really, it is probably better served as background listening than anything else. For that reason, I might rate it lower if I had heard the purportedly superior Diamond Life first (although I own that one too!), but maybe it's better to have started with the weaker album so I can be that much more impressed by the real thing. At any rate, a definite keeper.
No comments:
Post a Comment