Trollheart

At the end of 1985 Bobby Brown was out of the band, replaced by Johnny Gill, who went on to record three more albums with New Edition, and is in fact still with them. The first he recorded with them will be the last example we'll look at here, 1988's Heart Break, said to be yet another move in the direction of more mature, polished pop and away from the “bubblegum” music of their previous years. Yeah, well, we'll just see about that...

Heart Break --- New Edition --- 1988 (MCA)


Interestingly, it starts with a synthy, almost prog-like intro, with a spoken vocal behind rising cheers and applause, which makes it sound as if the thing is live, and in fact segues into what also sounds like a live song, the actual opener (as the intro - called, in a flash of original thinking, “Introduction”! - lasts just over a minute) “That's the Way We're Livin'”, which comes across a little Prince-y circa 1999 or Purple Rain, with some surprisingly good guitar parts and for now, no rap. Very eighties dance, kind of reminds me of Five Star, though of course they were a female band. Fairly generic, but not too bad.

“Where it All Started” continues the Prince/Janet Jackson style, a slower, funky song with much programmed synth and keyboards, and a lot less guitar than the previous, and things slow down a little for “If it isn't Love”, a semi-ballad that gets a little more intense and passionate near the end. The album is peppered with things called “skits”, which are apparently twenty or thirty seconds of “street talk” as the guys discuss their conquests, real or imagined. They're nothing to do with the music, such as it is, so although there are three of them in total I'm going to ignore them.

Next up is “NE Heartbreak”, a dancy, Paula Abdul-inspired number, followed by a short annoying rap then “Crucial”, with more funky bass and stabbing synth --you know the sort: remember “What Have You Done for Me Lately?” That sort of thing: sudden, loud stabs of chords either on their own or in staccato sequence, the sort of thing pioneered by the likes of Jackson, Abdul and Prince, and which became an integral part of most dance music, it would seem, right up to today.

The first proper ballad comes in the form of “Superlady”, with some very tasty horns and a nice piano and guitar backing, and there's another laid-back smooth ballad following it, the rather not-bad “Can You Stand the Rain”. Okay, okay, it's actually quite good, in fact I'd pin it as the standout track on the album thus far. Very mature sounding, well crafted and quite effective. A third ballad follows, in the shape of “Competition”, and I have to admit, when they pull out the stops on the slower songs on this album they really do sound good. Lovely addition of sax helps to create a really cool atmosphere for this song.

And yes, there's a fourth ballad to come! Talk about throwing everything together! “I'm Comin' Home” is really nice, but to be honest I think these songs would have been better spread evenly throughout the album, where they would have had more of an impact, and serve to break up the faster (and quite frankly, inferior) songs. Also, having them one after the other lessens their effect, I believe, as you kind of think, “Oh here's another ballad”.

And yes, you guessed it! The album closes on yet another ballad: that's five in succession, almost half of the album. “Boys to Men” is a nice song, and did in fact apparently inspire the creation of another Boyband - can you guess which one? - but at this point it's number five of five, and though it's very good in its own right, I maintain my opinion that it would have had more effect had it come after a fast song, or even a bad one. As it is, I find it a case of the shrugging of the shoulders, a very small bit like the recent John Sykes album I reviewed, Loveland, which is nothing but ballads and slow songs. I love them, but they have their time and place, and unless you're someone like Air Supply (and even they rock out very occasionally! Okay, no they don't, but they try, bless their little hearts – they don't know they're born, do they?) you really can't expect a full album of ballads to hold the attention.

So that's the last of our look at the first credited Boyband, New Edition. I'm not singularly impressed by them - but then, I didn't really expect to be - but I have to grudgingly admit they have a little bit more about them than I had originally expected. This is the band that gave us “Candy girl”, after all! Nonetheless, I don't see their albums remaining on my hard disk once this article is finished.

TRACK LISTING

1. Introduction
2. That's the Way We're Livin'
3. Where it All Started
4. If it ain't Love
5. Skit #1
6. N.E Heartbreak
7. Crucial
8. Skit #2
9. You're Not My Kind of Girl
10. Superlady
11. Can You Stand the Rain
12. Competition
13. Skit #3
14. I'm Comin' Home
15. Boys to Men

After fleecing New Edition and then being sued by them, thus having to release them from their ironclad contract, our good friend Fagin - sorry, Maurice Starr! - simply dusted himself off and went in search of another band he could make money off. This time he went for five white guys as opposed to black, and so New Kids on the Block were born.

And so I pack up my laptop (after having availed of the hotel's power supply to charge it up for the journey) and pop on my shades as the early morning sunlight filters through the far-off mountains and sparkles off the pools of unnameable substance that dot the ground around here. I hear my taxi arrive, pay my bill and head out to the car, jumping in the back.

We're on the road again, where rather worryingly, more Boybands await...

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018