Customer Reviews:
Showing reviews 6-10 of 118
 Awesome Album! January 30, 2007
A. Dickinson (Phoenix, AZ)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
I get so many compliments on this album because I play it in my truck often. It is truly one of my very favorites. Came to me in great shape and with no waiting.
Still Great January 5, 2007
George R. Winfield (Cushing,MN USA)
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
This is the second time that I have bought this album,the first time was when it was originaly released on tape forgot about it until it was featured on a TV show this time i bought on CD still sounds great years later glad I bought!!!!!
 Practice CD November 6, 2006
Jaron Smith (Dallas, Texas)
2 out of 6 found this review helpful
The first two tracks are to of my favorites of Annie's especially "Why".
"Why" always reminds me of Ivan on Season 2 of "So, You Think You Can Dance". So, what happen to the rest of the CD? It is as if Annie was thinking "I can't make an album of 2 songs." so, she went to the CD of the latest practice session and stuck it on the back of the 2 songs and called it an album.
 Soul on Ice Maiden September 25, 2006
Gregor von Kallahann
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
It's always risky to close out an album with a novelty number as Annie Lennox does on this, her first solo release. Actually, the very inclusion of a novelty tune at all is kind of chancy. But thrown in as a closer, a jaunty bit of a lark can risk undercutting the mood of an entire album (at least for those who play CDs straight through these days). And by rights, the capper on this album, a 1930s style chauvinistic chestnut called "Keep Young And Beautiful" could be said to undermine what is, after all, an otherwise moody and atmospheric set.
But, go figure, but it works perfectly. You gotta hand it to the Scots siren, after a good deal of introspective sombreness, this bit of Jazz Age fluff is just about the cat's meow.
In fact, if the gorgeous gloom of the rest of the album (particularly as manifested on the tracks "Cold," "The Gift" and the big hit "Why") was kind of starting to get oppressive, the closer not only makes for a lighthearted exit, but actually makes a statement of sorts about "womanhood" in the '90s (when the record was first released) and the pre-feminist early 20th century.
And that is simply this: as hard as it may be to be an autonomous, independent, and (yes) liberated woman, it's hands down better than having to "keep young and beautiful, if you want to be loved..." Times have changed, and life and love have gotten maddeningly complex. But would you really be better off with an empty head and "a Marcel wave in your hair"? I didn't think so.
As for the rest of the album, well, it suffers a bit from saving much of the best stuff for last, including two of the three titles I cited above. "Why," of course, is the opener and it's just about a perfect pop record. You fall into it and fall in love with it, even before you quite realize what it's about. (I remember thinking it might have more social import or philosophical heft than it actually does: songs with titles like "Why" sometimes do.) But while I subsequently came to like the two or three songs that follow it well enough, they never seemed fully developed, never quite rich enough. "Walking On Broken Glass" continues the broken heart theme of "Why," but its profession of heartache is (of course deliberately) set to a jarringly sprightly bounce of a melody and a kitschy ice arena arrangement. Maybe it too should be viewed as somthing of a novelty tune.
DIVA has been hailed for its musical and lyrical spareness, as even the prosaic titles ("Precious," "Cold," "Primitive," et al.) suggest. Even when the title is a bit longer and more evocative, as for example "Legend In My Living Room," the narrative can be a bit skimpy. Starts off promisingly as a reminiscence of the singer's wild and wooly years and then devolves into so many "Have mercies." Tuneful enough, but there goes any hope of a grand statement, even if she does own up to being "the queen of doom"
But those gospel-styled shout outs do remind us of one Lennox's trademark stylistic devices (and, arguably, one her chief strengths). She can sing big, and she can sing black, but it's always a least a little ironic and definitely cold cold cold. I read once that she's been called the "white Grace Jones." But she's actually got a more powerful delivery than the devilish Ms. Jones ever did. I'd call her more of a cross between Grace SLICK (now that would be a dream duet--Gracie and Annie) and Aretha (who actually did duet with Ann on "Sisters Are Doin' It For Themselves"). Heavy on the soulful inflection, even heavier on the irony. If you hail from Aberdeen, and not Alabama, is there any other way to go?
Well, you can go one up on Sting, say. "Why" wraps up with a letter-perfect Sting-style litany ("This is the book I never read/These are the words I never said"). It builds so dramatically, so authoritatively that you don't want to argue with its conclusion. Yeah, that jerk never had a CLUE about how she felt. Of course, we never doubt her assertion that for her part, SHE could always read what her lover was thinking. She knew how HE felt. Post-modern sexual stereotyping? Or just a simple truth about a specific relationship. And is the song autobiographical enough that that relationship was real, or is it a fiction? Dunno. Things were so much easier back in the day of "Keep Young And Beautiful."
She's the Greatest May 26, 2006
Dyan Carerra (Wild Wild West)
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
You've got to get this one. Usually cover songs are not that great when sung by other artists, but Annie does all the songs here much justice...great versions of even greater songs. I simply love Whiter Shade of Pale. Annie's got such a soulfully smooth vocal, you just can't help but be hooked from the first song. This one'll be a classic for a long time.
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