I'm not stolen from the soulless, I'm just driven to the white

Continuing my trip back through the 1990 album charts.

11/02/90 : The Sweet Keeper - Tinita Tikaram

This isn't the one with the ones everyone knows on it, but I'm imagining it doesn't stray too far from that territory - I've never heard it (or owned it, 8-47) but I'm quite looking forward to it.

Yeah - this is a decent enough set of tracks presented well.  I was very much reminded of Suzanne Vega (with a lower voice) and Joan Armatrading and I found myself nodding along to them - the main problem is that the album doesn't have a "Twist In My Sobriety" or "Good Tradition" to drag people in, although I did like the strings on "Little Sister Leaving Town".  It's all perfectly "nice" - not challenging in any way, if that's what you're looking for.  I wouldn't say it quite verges into the territory of the bland, but I'm sure plenty would disagree with me.

We're at #6 in the charts on her second week of a seven week run with it having peaked at #3 - it seems like the fans bought it as soon as is came out and then it plummeted like a stone.  The top five this week were Phil Collins, Eric Clapton, Lisa Stansfield, Technotronic and (quite obviously) a Cat Stevens best-of and we have two new entries in the top ten - The Mission (#7) and Everything But The Girl (#10 with The Language Of Life, which is a very peculiar jazzy kinda thing).

Wikipedia tells us the album exists and tells us the critics kinda liked it, but couldn't bring themselves to be too nice about it - one saying it "barely compares to Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell" (and although I'm not a great fan of either of them, I'd struggle to argue with that statement) and another saying "they'll love it in Basingstoke and Norway".  And he was right because it got to #2 in Norway, which was the best it did anywhere but it was pretty successful in several European countries - only #115 in the US though.

"Customers also listened to" Black, Cock Robin, Vaya Con Dios and Melanie - I've seen Black live (back in '89?) but that's all I've got on that lot.  I don't really have anything insightful to say about Tanita - it was fine and although I've already forgotten all the tracks on the album, I'd be perfectly happy to listen to it again.

04/02/90 - No, no, no
18/02/90 - A very enjoyable revisit

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