Seal: Soul

Elly Roberts reviews

Seal: SoulDistributed by
Warner Brothers

• Released: November 2008
• Rating: 4/10
• Vote and comment on this album:View Comments

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Dance hero trawls back catalogue. Not a good idea.

Born in Nigeria, 45 year-old Seal Henry Olusegun Kwassi Olumide Adelo Samuel – (yes really) aka Seal, hasn’t exactly been having much commercial success in recent years. He’ll always be remembered for three, very different songs. Hits, Killer (1990), singing on Adamski’s dance anthem, Crazy (1990) and the brilliant ballad A Kiss From A Rose (1995). Since then, things have been very patchy to say the least.

Now he turns his attention, for whatever reason, to a covers collection.

Seal doesn’t have a great voice, much in the same vein as Lemar. On this occasion SHOKOAS is seriously out of his depth. You only have to listen to masters of the genre – Marvin Gaye, Otis Redding, Al Green et al, to remind you of his shortcomings. The latter had one individual quality – controlled passion, along with great and individual voices, immediately identifiable. Here, it’s not just the famous songs but the luminaries who penned them – Sam Cooke, James Brown, Al Green, Eddie Floyd, Curtis Mayfield, Gamble & Huff, and pretty famous chap called James Brown.

And there lays the problem for Seal. Almost all these songs were written and performed by those stars, so they’re coming from ‘somewhere’ Mr. Samuel wouldn’t understand, and it shows at every level of his delivery. Currently pushed by lead off single A Change Is Gonna Come, the album stands at 17 (w/c Mon 17 Nov).

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Firstly, Seal hasn’t gone out of his way to really make these songs his own, like many Mick Hucknall has achieved (with odd exception).

Unlike the originals, despite the efforts of the orchestration and arrangements, they lack credibility highlighted on It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World, and the single, as they lack any kind of perspiration and grit. Having recently seen Al Green live, there’s no way Seal matches the Reverend on Here I Am (Come And Get Me), though he does a reasonable job, and is arguably the best version here, along with maybe Al Green’s classic I’m Still In Love With You.

The band and backups are top drawer, only to fall flat on a limp I’ve Been Loving You Too Long and gutless If You Don’t Know Me By Now – who can ever forget the brilliant original by Harold Melvin, and even better Simply Red. Again it’s the band which lets down Knock On Wood – lack of bite and sharpness turns this into an MOR version, almost. Deniece Williams’s Free, is, well, a disaster, to be blunt. Oh, and there’s a not so good an attempt at one of the greatest love songs ever – Stand By Me (Ben.E.King)

Bottom line is, Seal isn’t good enough a singer to carry of such a project, and it’s too smooth for its own good, sounding like cabaret soul.

File under: Oops! Not for aficionados.

Weblink:seal.com

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The full list of tracks included are :

1. A Change Is Gonna Come
2. I Can’t Stand The Rain
3. It’s A Man’s Man’s Man’s World
4. Here I Am (Come And Take Me)
5. I’ve Been Loving You Too Long
6. It’s Alright
7. If You Don’t Know Me By Now
8. Knock On Wood
9. I’m Still In Love With You
10. Free
11. Stand By Me
12. People Get ReadyView the discussion thread.blog comments powered by Disqus= 0) {query += ‘url’ + i + ‘=’ + encodeURIComponent(links[i].href) + ‘&’;}}document.write(”);})();//]]]]>]]>

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