Introducing the hardline according to Terence Trent D'Arby --- Terence Trent D'Arby --- 1987 (Columbia)
It was only after reviewing this for my "Classic albums" journal that I was made aware of how great an album Terence Trent D'Arby's debut is, and I felt it deserved a full review. Not only that, but this album marked both the introduction of this artist to the scene as well as the highpoint of his career. Spawning four hit singles and crammed with other great tracks, this album is certainly one to treasure, and yet perhaps D'Arby overreached or oversold himself, claiming it to be one of the most important albums of the twentieth century. Arrogance is never taken kindly, even when that arrogance is in part justified. This
is a very important album, but to put it up alongside "Sgt Pepper's"? I don't know, Dayyy-vey...
It certainly allowed TTD (I'm going to have to shorten his name to that) to burst onto the scene in the late eighties like a sun being born, and he without question lit up the charts, with massive hits like "If you let me stay" and "Sign your name" kicking the living crap out of the charts. From nowhere he came, this man who used three names, and then to push the stellar analogy a little further, he burned out and imploded, and nothing more was, commercially, heard of him after that. He actually died, in a way, which I will relate at the end of this review. But for now, it's the album we're concerned with, and to be fair, as an r&b/soul effort it's not something I would have expected to have been interested in, and I wasn't, at the time, my head full of Motorhead and Maiden and Genesis and Supertramp. But listening to it now, I can see how it was something very special indeed.
It opens with a sort of African chant in "If you all get to Heaven", with powerful marching synth and clashing drums, and you can hear from the beginning that this man has definitely got talent. His voice soars above the music, much of which he also plays himself, as well as writing virtually every track. Impressive, for a man just starting out on his career, only twenty-five at the time. There's a very ethnic feel to this opener, and it's a powerful start to the album. The next track is of course well known, one of his hit singles. "If you let me stay" starts with a spoken plea for another chance, behind a very seventies soul piano and bass melody before it takes off into an energetic, boppy song that pops along with great enthusiasm. Not a fan, as my regular readers know, of too much brass, but the horns here really work, and the funky guitar really drives the song. Great happy organ from Andy Whitmore, but it's D'Arby's voice that takes control and draws the attention. It's clear this is a man with a bright future ahead of him.
And up next is his biggest hit, the only song on which he collaborates with another songwriter, this being his bass player Sean Oliver. "WIshing well" is as I'm sure you know, not the Free rock standard nor the Wet Wet Wet song, but an original and has a real stark rhythm yet trips along nicely on a whistly synth hook and a squidging bass from Oliver. "I'll never turn my back on you (Father's words)" has a marching stride feel to it, very boogie in its feel and with some shining keyboard work as well as a superb little bassline, but I personally would class it as the weakest of the tracks on this album, which in fairness has very few low points. Another hit single, "Dance little sister" has D'Arby shouting "Get out of your rockin' chair grandma!" and then amending this to the more respectable "Or rather, would you care to dance, grandmother?" Clever. A Kid Creole style rhythm and melody carries the verses on the back of some fine horn work, with a guitar riff pulled from the best of the Belle Stars (and I use the term loosely), but it's when the chorus kicks in that the song really comes to life. No surprise it too was a hit.
There's a fine downbeat song to follow, in "Seven more days", with some sparkling keyboard and great vocal harmonies that almost puts me in mind of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. A cool shuffle then in "Let's go forward", with drum pads and some nice digital piano with synth sound effects. Again recalling much of the seventies soul greats such as Earth, Wind and Fire, Rose Royce and Odyssey. Again, Darby shows himself to be a hell of a singer on this song, and there are some squibbly little keyboard moves that almost get progressive rock at times, if only for a few seconds. The song itself is somewhat repetitive, and also puts me in mind of Sade, but there's something about it that fails to bore me. "Rain" has a great danceable energy about it, with some uptempo guitar and slick little synth lines. With a kind of gospel feel to it it's just one of those songs that cheers you up every time you hear it. Simple, uncomplicated, fun.
Then of course everyone knows the hit single "Sign your name", laidback, soft and gentle with an interesting little line in percussion, drony keyboard utilising an almost eastern style riff that makes you think of things like Cleopatra and the Pyramids, and a hook in the chorus to die for. Lovely. The superb "As yet untitled" though is where TTD really shows what he's capable of, singing the entire thing --- all four and a half minutes of it --- acapella, almost a lament that just tears through you. He's joined, also acapella, by backing singers on the chorus but takes most of the song himself, proving beyond all doubt that he needs no accompaniment or tricks to enhance that special voice of his. He really goes through the gamut of emotions on this, one of the definite standouts on a superb album, and at the end he grins "Meanwhile, on the other side of the world" and launches into a classy cover of Smokey Robinson's "Who's loving you?" that not only blows away the darker influences of the previous tracks and ends the album on a true high, but shows that he's not averse to paying his dues to those who have blazed the trail he follows.
TRACKLISTING
1. If you all get to Heaven
2. If you let me stay
3. Wishing well
4. I'll never turn my back on you (Father's words)
5. Dance little sister
6. Seven more days
7. Let's go forward
8. Rain
9. Sign your name
10. As yet untitled
11. Who's loving you?
After this incredibly impressive album, Terence Trent D'Arby was all set to conquer the world, and that world waited eagerly to see how he would manage to follow up "The hardline". Sadly, he did not. His next album released two years later failed to make the impression the debut had, creeping in around the fringes of the top ten in the UK and not even making the top fifty in the US. There were no hit singles, and why exactly this album did not replicate the success of "Hardline" I don't know; I haven't heard it, but wonder if it was the old "debut-album-too-good" syndrome? Perhaps expectations were too high, or perhaps it was a backlash against TTD's arrogance as to how good his debut album was, and people were just waiting to tear it to pieces. Some day I must listen to "Neither fish nor flesh" and make my own judgements as to whether or not it measured up to this.
At any rate, his next album would take five years to produce, and though received enthusiastically over here, it did not trouble the Billboard charts and the success he had begun to carve in America faded away as people forgot him. It didn't help, I'm sure, that in 1995 he changed his name to Sanandra Maitreya, legally changing it in 2001 and proclaiming that "Terence Trent D'Arby is dead". Sadly, he was, and he never made any sort of a resurgence under his new name, though he did well enough. But before he went, he left us this album to treasure. So if you haven't already, introduce yourself to Terence Trent D'Arby's Hardline: you won't regret it.