David Essex - Everlasting Love (1999)

David Essex's second collection of covers, following on from the masterful Cover Shot, does not, sadly, come close to matching the majesty of its predecessor. Less an album, more a simple gathering of cuts recorded at different periods throughout the '90s, it revisits a handful of numbers from the original set (the title track, "First Cut Is the Deepest," picks up on the 1994 hit version of "True Love Ways," and then meanders around some very pleasant songbooks without once demanding more of Essex than he could comfortably turn in. Cover Shot impressed because of the interpretive powers it called upon; Everlasting Love disappoints because it could have been recorded in the bathtub -- albeit one that secretes a full band and orchestra somewhere between the soap dish and the rubber ducks. It's a pleasant album to be sure, but Essex is capable of far more than this.
© Dave Thompson /TiVo