Downes and Hughes have always seemed an unlikely pairing.
Reflecting that notion, Membran Music have matched up Geoff Downes and The New Dance Orchestra's
'Collection' CD with the
Downes/Hughes '
Worktapes' CD in this neat, 2 CD digipack offering, titled '
Roads Of Destiny'.
The
'Collection' is a "best of..." culled from Downes' inventive, often memorable, usually instrumental and occasionally indulgent set of releases through the nineties,
'Light Programme', '
Vox Humana', '
Evolution' and '
World Service'. It was originally released in 2003.
Thus began the Downes / Hughes connection, with Hughes providing a moving vocal performance on a rework of the Buggles' (Downes&Trevor Horn) pop hit '
Video Killed The Radio Star'. Sketched around Downes' dominant piano, the mood of the original version - a curiously joyful recognition of the demise of a whole genre of popular music - is changed entirely here. Out with the bombast, in with breathy, reined in vocals and sonorous piano lines, combining to create an expressive, powerful version of a song that sounds like it started life as a jingle.
The
'Collection's centrepiece is a trio of cover versions of universally famous pop & rock hits, all seminal recordings, '
Whiter Shade Of Pale', '
Dust In The Wind' and
'Nights In White Satin'.
A further, distinctively uncomfortable
Downes/Hughes collaboration comes on the track '
Don't Walk Away'. Almost a great song, very close to Beauvoir's Crown Of Thorns, but recorded in a key that just doesn't suit Hughes' vocals.
Elsewhere, 4 lyrical, consecutively sequenced instrumentals,
Moscow', '
Zurich', '
Paris' and '
London' showcase Downes' skill as a writer, musician and producer. A point emphasised by the album's Korg Sampler closer, an instrumental rerun of
'Video...'.
The
'Work Tapes' is exactly what it says on the tin. A work in progress, incomplete, arguably experimental . . . but strangely hypnotic and satisfying.
No guitars here, just keyboards, synths and drums. You would think these would jibe with Hughes's raw, soulful vocals, and yes there are songs where they just don't quite connect, but on others this juxtaposition works an absolute treat.
The funkilicous '
Love For Sale' and '
Push' are fabulous songs, each threaded with a Stevie Wonder-like pop sensibility.
With a less artificial studio treatment, '
How Was I To Know' and 'Walking On A Thin Line' could have been immense songs for Hughes.
It's only when you realise the songs on '
The Work Tapes' were recorded in 1994, on the cusp of the 'grunge revolution', that you understand why they gathered dust for so long.
An unlikely pairing indeed, but two powerful, entertaining and satisfying albums just the same.
Written by
Brian Sunday, June 24, 2007
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