And being on the bottom line, sure ain't no fun

Continuing my trip back through the 1988 album charts.

04/12/88 : Wanted - Yazz


I liked "The Only Way Is Up", but I'm not sure I could have told you there was an accompanying album - it'll be interesting to see if the other tracks manage to hold their own against that powerhouse.

Well, it starts out with TOWIU which I'd not heard in years so it was good to catch up with that and it was also good to be reminded of "Stand Up For Your Love Rights", which I doubt I'd heard since it was in the charts in '88. And you know what? The rest of the album is actually not bad at all - it's all well done and there's a nice bit of variety across the album including pop, dance, house and jazz. I was expecting this to be bearable, but it easily exceeded that - it feels that given a chance (which it won't be) this could easily be a grower.

We're at #10 in the charts this week on her third week of a very decent 30 week run, with it having peaked at #3 in its debut week. The top five this week were Now! 13, Kylie and best-ofs from Cliff Richard, Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Dire Straits, with the highest new entry being Rick Astley (#8).

Wikipedia tells us it's her debut album, there were some singles from it and that's pretty much your lot. Checking out her entry to pad things out a bit, she's had quite the life! She played volleyball for the England U19s, became a model, became a singer, married her manager (who was a mere 16 years older than her) and then found God and has pretty much given it all up - but still pops up here and there from time to time. Critically, Billboard were very nice about the album, declaring it "chock full of unexpected delights" and commercially it did OK making the top forty in various random countries and #8 in Sweden.

discogs.com tells us you can pick up a decent copy for a mere quid but if you want the full Yazz experience, then there's a 3 CD box set with nine bonus tracks and 24 mixes for £44 - not the rip-off we've seen for some albums, but probably more Yazz than most people need. But the single album maintains a decent level of quality and variety throughout and was considerably more enjoyable than I was expecting.

27/11/88 - Average material, not in the slightest bit elevated
11/12/88 - Average material, somewhat elevated

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