Physical Fails Olivia's Image
Album Review By Greg Brow
Olivia Newton-John has one of the most pleasing voices in the music industry, so why doesn’t she use it to sing the nice kinds of songs that she used to?
Several years ago in an interview she said she would never record songs that contained risque lyrics, but on “Physical,” her new album from MCA Records, she seems very determined to shed her good-girl-next-door image and replace it with what might be called “musical prostitution.”
On at least three of the tunes, she sings about (1) being caught in a love triangle, (2) a sex-starved nymph who tells her paramour to can all the small talk because she can’t wait to hop in the sack, and (3) in the title song, she says, “There’s nothin’ left to talk about unless it’s horizontally.”
If she wants to change her image, I suggest she flash her sexy body for the news media, or get busted for possession of drugs, but keep singing the pretty little country-pop songs that we’ve all come to know and love.
I’m not intentionally cutting down Olivia. I think she is a very talented lady with a lot to offer, but lately, even with her last album, “Totally Hot,” her music seems to be suffering from the illusion of changing with the times. Changes are okay, but they’re supposed to be for the better.
The other songs on the album are only mediocre little ditties moaning about lost love or praising new-found love.
The problem is that most of these songs aren’t even very melodic. They consist mostly of Olivia wasting her talent by screeching the words, most of which are sung differently than the way they are printed on the album. I guess it’s hard to concentrate singing correctly while at the same time trying to appear sexy and wild.
Okay, enough mud-slinging. It is my intention to be both negative and positive when I do these reviews, and I will be just as fair to Olivia Newton-John as anyone else. There is some excellent musicianship on this album, a good portion of which is provided by producer-songwriter John Farrar.
Farrar has been with Olivia since the beginning, and has been very influential on her career, composing such hits as “A Little More Love” and “Have You Never Been Mellow?” Also appearing on the album are drummer Michael Botts, formerly of the now defunct rock group Bread, and guitarists Steve Lukather and David Hungate of Toto.
Farrar wrote or co-wrote five of the ten songs on the new album and in spite of their subject matter, they are written very well lyrically. Farrar seems to know how to organize his thought into well-crafted verse, giving then the potential to be fine moments of music.
In the opening song, “Landslide,” he has Olivia singing, “You know it was a landslide - My head was saying this is the man - And my heart agreed- My minor desires - turned to major needs.”
And in “The Promise,” a tune about the plight of dolphins, which Olivia composed herself, lyrical talent displays itself by remarking that “they have no room for hatred - tho’ they’ve suffered much pain from the race we call human-who are afraid to love.
The words read quite nicely. Too bad the melodies are not equally as pleasing.
I’m not giving up on Olivia Newton-John though, as said, she does have a pleasant voice and I know what she can do with it. I just hope she starts doing it again soon.
List of songs:
Landslide (John Farrar)
Strangers Touch (John Farrar Steve Kipner)
Make A Move On Me (John Farrar-Tom Snow)
Falling (John Farrar)
Love Make Me Strong (Terry Britten-Sue Shifrin)
Physical (Steve Kipner-Terry Shaddick)
Silvery Rain (Hank Marvin)
Carried Away (Barry Gibb Albhy Galuten)
Recovery (John Farrar-Tom Snow)
The Promise (The Dolphin Song) (Olivia Newton-John)