Diana Ross – Thank You (Album)

Well, we had two big album releases today so naturally I’m honour-bound to review them both. I’ve just now finished the ABBA write up, and I’ve just seen that Thank You is a 13 track album and it’s already 1:08 in the morning. There’s nearly 50 minutes of song to listen to, so no matter what, I’m going to be here til 2am, at the earliest. Please, for the love of opinion, be thankful for my sacrifice.

No pre-amble here, it’s too late in the day for that, so I’m going to just crack on. Read the ABBA review if you want the details for how this will work, or carry on reading and you’ll get the hang of it. In fact, no, go to the ABBA review. I want the views.

First up we have the title track, Thank You, which I handily reviewed back when it was released as a single. That’ll save me some time. I scored it 2/10, go check it out to find out why.

The second track is If The World Just Danced, another single that we’ve already had a chance to listen to. I haven’t officially or unofficially reviewed this, but seeing as it’s probably not new to any of you that care enough about the album to be reading this review, I’ll keep it simple.

This an overly repetitive, but very catchy song. I understand the need to force an idea into the minds of an audience – we do it here all the time with one very particular thought we here at TGTRS share – but there’s doing it, and doing it to the extent that appears to be happening in this album so far. I did some maths in the Thank You review, I’m not doing it here, but I suspect that they’d be fairly similar stats. But it is catchy, and right up until the massive repetition of the title at the end, and excluding the weird thumbing noise at the start, pre-vocals, I actually quite enjoy it. It’s a bop, encouraging us to just go ahead and dance, something that – though I might be mistaken – she thinks would make the world a better place. 6/10

Jeez, even the artwork is telling us all the titles…

All Is Well comes next, with a very different tone, feeling very much more like a club performance – but not a modern day nightclub, more like when you have an esteemed vocalist perform on a stage for a small-to-medium sized audience with a live band there. The classy sort of club performance. In fact, I get that feeling throughout. It’s a classy song. I’m not enjoying it, but it feels classy, like you could be sat there with a tasty alcoholic drink enjoying the ambience and the company. The music, though, really works wonders, especially the drum. Whoever is playing the drums on this track hit the brief nicely as far as I’m concerned. All the music playing elements did. Vocally, it’s not so great. The backing vocals, at times, sound like something you’d expect in the Star Trek theme (Original Series) and just feels a bit out of place because of it. Diana herself feels like she’s comfortable up on the stage I envision, but not entirely competent enough any more, if that makes sense? She knows what to do, but she’s past that stage of being able to do it well. The moment has passed, the opportunity gone, and yet there she is, still doing it anyway, whether it’s out of pride or necessity. 5/10

Next up we have In Your Heart, which starts off feeling like a performance piece. In fact, I can actually, in my mind’s eye, see Diana Ross doing this song in the same way Barney Stinson did his one man show on How I Met Your Mother, though now we’ve hit the one minute mark, it definitely feels more like a song than a poor performance piece. I’m not enjoying this one either, by the way. Maybe I just don’t get it, but a lot of it feels like words have just been thrown together. Like jazz poetry, that’s what this is. Jazz poetry. I fucking hate jazz poetry, with the exception of the snippet of Grim Fandango where you take the piss out of it by just choosing random sentences from the prompts and making something truly appalling with it. I can’t describe it any better than I already have, although I have only just experienced the auto-tune moment, which made me wince just enough that I noticed it. I am wearing a grimace, not a smile. The song needs to end so I can finish writing about it, because right now, I’m just doing this to pad the time in case the end redeems it. It’s a fade, it has not redeemed anything. 3/10

Just In Case immediately feels like a more thoughtful song, in fact, the introduction of vocals and piano give another club-performance feel, though this time without the out-of-her-depth element to it. It’s tasteful, it’s generally enjoyable -though the piano’s repetition is somewhat annoying to me – with the strings carrying a lot of the mood and doing a superb job at it. The trumpet! Oh, good heavens, the trumpet. I love it. This, right here, is the current highlight of the album. It’s not the best song in the world, not even the best song I’ve heard today, but this is currently the contender for song of the album, for being the key performance of the lot. 8/10

I know I’ve criticised the songs here, but she does have style, and just look at that hair!

The Answer’s Always Love feels a bit like a theme tune, the sort of thing you’d hear at the end of a movie as the credits roll. You know, the first song, not the second one. There’s been a lovey dovey film, the person has engaged in a romantic relationship with an appropriately gendered individual for their own preferences, the feeling is mutual, there may even have been a coupling ceremony like a wedding or civil partnership, and the two (or maybe even more) people in the relationship are going to do the whole life happily ever after thing. And then this music kicks in as you see the names being to roll.

It would fit that purpose, but I don’t think it’s an overly good song. I’m not particularly enjoying it, and there’s a chance that’s because it’s just gone half 1 in the morning, but I think it’s more likely to be because it’s a bad song. It’s too cliche, too soft for such a soft topic – there’s no contrast to make it pop. It’s just a safe song. Like entering a cake contest and making a Victoria Sponge. Sure, you won’t get it wrong, but you won’t win either, you know? That’s what this is. The safe song to get people on board because hey, we all like love, right? It’s bland, it’s tasteless, it’s just not something I’m enjoying, no matter how much jam you decide to put on it.

Next we have Let’s Do It, which could mean a few things, but I’m gonna assume it’s sex because there’s very much a modern nightclub feel to the backing music, the way the vocals have been processed in the mixing stage. It avoids the trap of being too repetitive, vocally, but the music is basically the same few bars over and over and over, with a few gaps to break it up every now and then. It’s a poor quality song, which if I understand the lyrics properly, is about trying to make peoples’ lives better by being a decent person to them. Bit of a shame that anyone feels the need to do a song about that concept, but as a human that knows other humans, I can concur that we are, generally, assholes and we need to stop being. And of course, the outro section has an abundance of the title. 3/10

I Still Believe feels like another classy club song, but without as much of the quality. There’s an almost circus feel to some of the vocals, until the 45-second-ish mark, when all of a sudden it picks up the pace, the quality and feels like something I could bop to. In fact, I am bopping right now, got a little foot sway and a hip swing going on as I type this. It’s mostly involuntary, too, which is remarkable, because I am getting a bit tired.

Honestly, I was going to mark this song down quite low, but it’s been salvaged by the tonal shift. It’s turned it from a song that felt almost dreary, into this cheerful tune. She still sounds like she’s past it, to me, but at least the rest of the song is covering some of that for her. The backing vocalists have a fairly simple job of aaah-ing every so often, but there’s more trumpet and it’s used excellently to get an almost Barry Manilow style feel with that song about the dancer whose name I can’t remember at that club I can’t spell the name of. That’s what I think, and I quite like that song. 6/10

The camera is over here…

The 9th song, Count On Me has that same sort of piano in a club with a spotlight on the female singer feel to it, and after Just In Case, I’m not as concerned about that as I thought I would be. It’s calming, it’s thoughtful, it’s a decent song all in all, though again, there’s a bit too much title repetition for my liking, with the first chorus being literally four lines, all of which are the song title. It’s flawed, but it’s overall quite decent. It’s almost beautifully haunting, actually. The piano works well with her voice, though there are times when there’s a sort of electronic bell sort of noise, that doesn’t really fit. The line “just close your eyes and I’ll be right there by your side”, spoken, are a little off putting. When I close my eyes to sleep, my bed will already be a bit crowded, I don’t want her to turn up too! 7/10

Tomorrow is next, and is immediately more upbeat, like the cheeky number they put in one of these performances so that the singer can have a wander around the audience. It sounds cheerful, but it doesn’t fit the tone of the rest of the album, especially the bits that are actually decent. Still got some trumpet there, so that’s good, but it’s all so much more fast paced, with even the drums sounding sufficiently artificial that it isn’t overly enjoyable to listen to. It’s not unpleasant, but it’s not a soul warming experience either. The excessive repetition strikes again here with the line “ain’t that the truth”, sang enough times in the last thirty seconds or so to become wedged into your head, unable to break free. 4/10

Three songs to go. First of these three? Beautiful Love is much like the other club-style decent songs on here, though it feels like it lacks the charm of the other songs. The drum works, the bass works, but it’s almost like she’s trying to channel Back to Black Amy Winehouse at times, which just isn’t something that feels right. It could almost be a Bond theme, actually, the way it goes at times, though her voice wobbles a bit in places and has me thinking again that maybe, just maybe, she’s out of her depth a bit. 4/10

Time To Call is the next to last song tonight and it’s just coming up to 2am here for me, so by the looks of things, I should be done by quarter past. Good, I’m getting eager to sleep! Especially since this, and the ABBA, haven’t gone up til six hours from now.

The intro to Time To Call reminds me of another song, but I can’t tell what it is, exactly. It’s a song about being appreciative for what we have, while we have it, or at least, that’s what I take from it. The piano provides a suitable, thoughtful accompaniment to that theme, and while I question the need for a religious element to the song in inviting the audience to pray – before yet again repeating the title far more than it needs to be repeated, in quick succession – the underlying message is an important one. We do take those closest to us for granted sometimes, and it’s been more important than ever to truly cherish an opportunity to spend time with our nearest and dearest.

The song is let down by the apparent need to make sure no one mistakes this song for any of her others though, just like the bulk of the rest. There must be a reason for it, I wonder if it’s medical, but ultimately, it’s only my business and bothering me because it’s bothering me. 5/10

It almost looks like she’s pointing at the score totals, below. I wouldn’t laugh.

And here we are with the final song, Come Together, which has made me (unfairly) think of The Frog Chorus. Let’s move onto the actual review, shall we?

It’s a higher pitch than it ever needed to be, almost an assault upon the ears, before stopping completely and being replaced by what I can only assume was Diana Ross singing on a table, doing her own backing vocals and incessantly repeating the title again. I’m not enjoying this one either, which is disappointing, because a part of me hoped it would end on a high, when really, it feels probably like she was high. There’s a choral hum and clap thing going on in the final third of the song and it fits the tone quite nicely, making this feel like it’s part of a group performance, but the end featuring a trumpet blast with the title spoken, yet again, just tilts me. It’s just too much. 4/10

Title	Score
Thank You	2/10
If The World Just Danced	6/10
All Is Well	5/10
In Your Heart	3/10
Just In Case	8/10
The Answer’s Always Love	5/10
Let’s Do It	3/10
I Still Believe	6/10
Count On Me	7/10
Tomorrow	4/10
Beautiful Love	4/10
Time To Call	5/10
Come Together	4/10
[TOTAL]	62/130

Well, I’ve totted that up and I make it 62/130, which comes to about 4.7/10, so we’ve got a 5/10 again. I’ve longed considered albums to be a collection of poor quality songs, supported by one of two decent ones, and every album review I’ve done so far has sort of highlighted that point quite nicely. Good to know.

As always, let us know what you think, whether you agree or not, and thank you for reading.

-TG