Soul Kiss review
Soul Kiss, Olivia Newton-John, MCA Records
Soul Kiss is Olivia Newton John’s first studio album since she broke her squeaky-clean image with the release of Physical in 1980.
Even though Newton John seems to have tamed her voice since then, Soul Kiss continues to provide her audience with a combination of adult contemporary and mainstream format songs that will continue her string of successful singles.
The tracks on Soul Kiss provide the listener with the usual Newton John vocals of vitality and sincerity. The one thing that Newton John does not do in her latest effort is experiment with new types of music. This can either be good or bad. Newton-John is good at providing a great balance of mellow and up tempo music, but if she continues to be mellow she may fall into oblivion along with adult contemporary stars of the past. The would be unfortunate since Newton-John still holds much potential.
Soul Kiss opens up with an uptempo song, “Toughen Up” in this song as well as others Newton-John seems to convey her message of being a woman in the 80s and not letting others lead her around.
Newton-John continues to provide audiences with her silky provocative voice and lyrics in tracks such as Soul Kiss and Moth To A Flame Even at age of 38 she can still strut her style that became popular in Grease and Physical.
One idea that Newton John does use in several tracks is the addition of sound effects throughout the cuts. The tracks “Driving Music” and “Queen of the Publication” use the sound effects of a taxi cab and a typewriter respectively in good fashion.
Newton John resorts back to her roots of strong ballads in Emotional Tangle and The Right Moment, while getting assistance from Beach Boy Carl Wilson on 60s style duet You Were Great How Was I?
Soul Kiss is not Olivia Newton-John’s best album to date, but neither is it her worst. It is simply an album that provides her fan with the style of music for which she is best known and it is presented in fine manner.
By John Bauer