CHER: LOVE HURTS (1991)
1)
Save Up All Your Tears; 2) Love Hurts; 3) Love And Understanding; 4) Fires Of
Eden; 5) I'll Never Stop Loving You; 6) Could've Been You; 7) One Small Step;
8) A World Without Heroes; 9) When Love Calls Your Name; 10) When Lovers Become
Strangers; 11) Who You Gonna Believe; 12) The Shoop Shoop Song (It's In His
Kiss)*.
Third time's the charm? Not a general rule. The
Eighties are formally over, but we are still living in the pre-Nevermind era, and so Love Hurts faithfully follows the
formula that brought Cher back to commercial success — and why, pray tell,
should anybody expect otherwise? Here we have eleven more anthemic glam rockers
and power ballads, contributed by old friends and newcomers; no more Bon Jovi
or Michael Bolton, but a whole three
songs from Diane Warren this time, of which ʽLove And Understandingʼ, strongly
echoing Olivia Newton-John's ʽMagicʼ in rhythm and melody, but updated for the
modern dance-pop era, charted the highest — still nowhere near as high as the
singles from Heart Of Stone, though.
People were getting tired.
Strangely, the first song from the album, ʽSave
Up All Your Tearsʼ, did not chart that high, even if it essentially repeats the
formula of ʽIf I Could Turn Back Timeʼ — danceable, powerful, chorus-wise
catchy, not particularly irritating, in short, probably the best song on the
entire record (that's not saying much, though). Perhaps it was because people
were already familiar with the original (and somewhat inferior in terms of
singing, though equally generic in terms of musical arrangement) version by
Bonnie Tyler, or perhaps it did reflect the trend of people getting tired of
stereotypical glam-pop; whatever the case, it's a bit of a fun opener.
After that, though, it's just one bore after
another. It does not help that Cher occasionally turns to classics (the title
track is one of those old torch ballads that heavy rock artists take a liking
to for some strange reason — I cringed when Nazareth were doing it, so why
should I be enjoying a Cher version? this is not the kind of material she'd do
convincingly even with a soft rock arrangement...), or hits upon a very strange idea, such as covering ʽA
World Without Heroesʼ from KISS' Music
From "The Elder" (I first thought this was due to Cher dating
Gene Simmons, but apparently that was over by 1980, so the idea hardly counts
as a loving memento) — and turning it into a crazy mess of synthesizer fanfares
and booming drums, over which she looms large with her most tragic intonations,
as if this really meant something.
But nothing really means anything on this
album, except for the single permeating thought — keep on being relevant! be on
(M)TV! get a hit! stay afloat! I am not saying that there are no decent melodic
ideas anywhere in sight — it is simply not very interesting to hunt for these
ideas when the album as a whole sounds so sterile, formulaic, calculated, and
monotonous. When you get to the bonus track, a modernized version of ʽThe Shoop
Shoop Songʼ, it's almost like a last merciful breath of fresh air in comparison
— a much-needed reminder that simple pop music had not always been like this, and that, while it may not have been much
smarter in the past, it used to at least sound more innocent, charming, and
just plain fun. Now, instead, it's
like you are required to take this synth-pop shit seriously — so please excuse me if I decide to "save up all my
tears" and give the record another predictable thumbs down.
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