Come On Over album review
(Olivia Newton-John will perform in concert tonight at 8 at Pan American Center, Las Cruces.)
“Come On Over” Olivia Newton-John (MCA Records MCA-2186)
Perhaps this observation is a bit tardy, because, I must confess, I haven’t devoted strict attention to the daily prog-ress of Olivia Newton-John’s career, but “Come On Over” shows, at the very least, that she has abandoned virtually all pretensions of being a country artist.
And that’s about all it shows.
She’s still raking in at least an occasional nomination for some such award in a country music category, but the days when she was winning those awards and getting acceptance and airplay from the C&W powerbrokers would seem to be over, juding by this new release.
It’s probably not coincidental that the list of sidemen on the jacket begins with the steel guitar credit. And the album begins with a Dolly Parton song, “Jolene.” But it’s all lip service.
Only on side one could any of the arrangements be even remotely classified as country, the steel guitar gets a brief passage in the middle of “It’ll Be Me,” and again in “Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain” along with a ridiculous twanging “boing” that’s either a Jew’s-harp or a rubber band. The instrumentation on side one is pop, with a sweet touch of rock and/or country.
Side two is pure slush, orchestrally masticated goo. Even the last number, Lennon-McCartney’s “The Long And Winding Road” (which was damaged enough by Phil Spector’s overdone strings on the Beatles’ “Let It Be” album), doesn’t carry enough intrinsic weight to survive. Strangely enough, the first cut on side two, “Don’t Throw It All Away,” is the best candidate besides “Jolene” for a country treatment because of its fading love lyrics. But Newton-John and producer John Farrar chose not to play it that way.
Although any of the 12 numbers could become hits, for indiscriminate Olivia Newton-John fans preoccupied with the fragile beauty of her face and voice, nothing here stands out like her hugely successful singles of the past. “Jolene” is pretty good until you recall the Dolly Parton original. The title cut and “Blue Eyes” aren’t too bad if you overlook major faults.
But the only song of any real interest is “Greensleeves,” the beautiful centuries-old English English b ballad. Accompaniment by the Queen Singers helps give it a fuller, stronger sound, but Newton-John still lacks the power even within her range to make it more than the memorable cut within an unremarkable album.