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Whitney
Whitney Houston |
Whitney Houston had a lot to live up to from the moment Saving
All My Love For You and its shiny video went public. Its unabashed
upward mobility and soft soul beat cast her as a woman who understood
the hard-nosed but still sensitive gogetter of the time. The
album that followed was a different matter entirely. The strength
of purpose of the single was lost as a quartet of unsympathetic
producers shoved her in as many unsuitable directions, and,
for the most part, by ignoring Saving's careful construction
her voice was left sounding little more than average.
At first glance, Whitney (1987) (the album) appears to be working
hard to rectify these mistakes. Three of the producers have
been replaced by three more and on the sleeve the 'sophisticated'
evening gown has given way to a singlet, a big smile and tousled
hair, Fun, fun, fun? Hardly. The songs inside make a mockery
of such joyful presentation as young Whitney Houston is making
a determined bid not simply to grow up, but to be old.
The most disastrous track on the first album was her cover of
The Greatest Love Of All, cumbersome Andrew Lloyd Webber arrangements
removed any heart and made the singer look inadequate as she
struggled to stay in front of the assembled pomp. For some reason,
Whitney Houston believes this is where her future lies, and
half this album's tracks would be more at home in a lavish West
End musical. Didn't We Almost Have It All, Where Are You, You're
Still My Man and Where Do Broken Hearts Go all hang heavy with
melodrama as they build up to climaxes so far out of reach she
shouts rather than sings the final lines. This arms aloft, head
thrown back approach has become so painfully familiar by the
end of the album that its closing with a cover of I Know Him
So Well comes as no surprise.
Whitney Houston is clearly no Barbra Streisand but the remaining
tracks show her to be not much else either. Three uptempo numbers,
I Wanna Dance With Somebody, Love Is A Contact Sport and So
Emotional, are so late '70s in style that any sparkle dulls
instantaneously. They come over like the creaky, cliched disco
music that folk who have never danced in their lives think is
groovy. Only once does she approach the sensuality of Saving.
Just The Lonely Talking is silky without being lush, its rumbling
bass, sparing electric strings and what sounds like a pedal
steel guitar allow plenty of space, leaving Whitney Houston
free of any pressure from behind. Now she can prove she knows
how to phrase and swell a ballad, while her urgent, breathy
tones gain rather than lose out to the fact she sings from her
throat and not her chest.
But this is only one song, and rather than relieving the others
it simply frustrates. Whitney Houston needs to loosen up a bit,
to act her age. At the moment she sounds like a lonely little
kid who has spent too much time with grown ups, and has picked
up a lot of their habits before she has fully understood their
ways. This is probably the case. As the daughter of Cissy Houston
and cousin of Dionne Warwick, family sing-songs on Boxing Day
must've been enough to turn any young girl's head.
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