UK REVIEWS FOR SENTIMENTAL

[PATRYK]

HELLO EVERYONE:

HERE IS THE Q REVIEW OF SENTIMENTAL WITH 3 AWARDED STARS.  NATTY, I LOOK FORWARD TO READING YOUR OTHER UK REVIEWS!!

TANITA TIKARAM
SENTIMENTAL--NAIVE
(THE GIRL WHO SANG TWIST IN MY SOBRIETY IS NOW A WOMAN)

TANITA TIKARAM HAS A FANTASTIC VOICE.  UMPTEEN YEARS AGO IT HELPED SHIFT FOUR MILLION COPIES OF HER DEBUT ALBUM, ANCIENT HEART.  SINCE THAT FORMIDABLE START, SHE HAS SLID INTO OBSCURITY, SO THE NEWS THAT THIS IS HER SIXTH STUDIO ALBUM WILL PROMPT MANY TO ASK WHAT HAPPENED TO ALBUMS TWO TO FIVE.  NOW 35, SHE STILL POSSESSES AN EXTRAORDINARY VOICE, HELPING TO MAKE SENTIMENTAL A COFFEE-TABLE JAZZ AFFAIR THAT PERCOLATES VERY NICELY.  NICK DUERDEN

[NattyBell]

Hi Patrick!

thanks! We only have one other one to date! Will put it on asap but working late tonight!

Natty

[NattyBell]

Hi

Please find below 2 UK reviews for Sentimental! It is a joy now to read them...what a turn for the books and about time too!!!!!!!


WORD: July 2005 Issue

Tanita Tikaram turns in a small triumph of vocal personality (also photo of pensive TT as on official website with caption 'Hang It All'

Tanita Tikaram, Sentimental by David Hepworth

It's 17 years since Tanita Tikaram made her first album Ancient Heart and sever years since her last tilt at the marketplace. Her next big birthday starts with a four. I point this out not to spoil her day but to indicate how hard it is for any performer to sustain interest in their work once the bloom has gone and how much harder indeed this is for a woman than a man.
In response to this challengev Sentimental is an older and wiser album which has been made in a refreshing spirit of "hang it all I prefer it this way". There's a small combo who are a model of restraint, the occasional wash of autumnal strings. some of those woodwinds that helped Dionne Warwick enquire about the whereabouts of San Jose and a couple of contributions from Nick Lowe (notably duetting on Don't Let The Cold) but mostly this is a small triumph of vocal personality, of which she proves to have a good deal more than you ever previously suspected. If Lowe's The Convincer needed a younger sister this could well be it. It has the same hard-won, demure beauty like its older brother it almost plays itself.

Sentimental is on Naive

UNCUT: July 2005 Issue

Tanita Tikaram, Sentimental, Naive ***

First album in seven years from former teenage sensation. Strange to think that Tikaram's big hits "Good Tradition" and "Twist In My Sobriety" came exactly half her lifetime ago. Just two albums in the last decade after making four in the first five years of her career represents a serious reduction in the creative flow, but Sentimental suggests that maturity suits her. Her voice has become a rich and huskily sonorous instrument of great warmth and expressiveness, the jazzy, piano-nuanced arrangements have an admirably understated feel and the songs range from the captivatingly ("Play Me Again") to the jauntily infectious ("Don't Let The Cold").
Nigel Williamson


Hope you enjoy reading these!

Natty

[oil-rich sons]

Hi Natty - thanks for posting these.  It is refreshing to see these positive reviews.  However, I truly think that it's because Sentimental is very difficult to fault.  There's nothing to poke fun at, nothing too quirky.  Basically, on her past albums, a lazy critic was always able to throw some mud at her because of one or two aspects (the lyrics, the production, her appearance, her age).....

[PATRYK]

NATTY:

IT BLEW MY MIND THAT HEPWORTH DISCUSSED DIONNE WARWICK AND "DO YOU KNOW THE WAY TO SAN JOSE"  THAT WAS THE BURT BACHRACH INFLUENCE I HAVE BEEN DISCUSSING ALL ALONG RIGHT FROM THE START!  HE PRODUCED DIONNE'S SAN JOSE!  WE MUST HAVE THE SAME EAR BECAUSE HE IS THE FIRST OTHER PERSON THAT HAS CONFIRMED THIS.

WHY IS HE TALKING ABOUT TT BEING 40 WHEN SHE HAS A HALF DECADE TO GET THERE???!!!    RIDICULOUS!!

[NattyBell]

Hi!

Review of the album from Mojo to follow this evening! Shopping to do first and watching The Tour de France on TV ...very important  and I'll be there next week in Paris!!!! Hoorah!!!

Natty

[NattyBell]

Hi

Here is the Mojo August 2005 review of Sentimental as promised!

Tanita Tikaram
***
Sentimental  Naive

Mature and understated seventh album from a songwriting Spartan.

Tikaram has yet to match the multi-platinum sales peaks of her 1988 debut album, Ancient Heart, but that's no reflection on the quality of her output. Sh takes her time between releases, seeking out new ways t expand her musicality and, in the six years since her last outing, she's evidently caught a passion for understated jazz, and developed aspects of her already mellow, woody voice to complement the new songs she's writing in that style. The album flows easily by with each cut blending effortlessly into the next, but after a couple of listens, the individual character of every song begins to assert itself - from the lazy orchestral sway of Everyday Is New to the scratchy rhythmic underpinning of Don't Let The Cold, one of two beautifully realised duets with Nick Lowe. This is one seductively intimate album.

Johnny Black


There is also a little promo advert of the album. We will scan this soon an post on the site!

It is such a shame though with all these good reviews that no more promotion for the album has happened!! No wonder really that the album hasn't gone very high in the Uk charts. Waht do other Uk fans think?!

cheers

Nathalie

[Cs. Andr]

About lack of promotion. I'm going to make some stickers and stick them on places people will notice ) I should have thought about this earlier.

[oil-rich sons]

I agree Natty.  Why no promotion?  It seems as if TT has just decided not to do "anything" to promote this album, especially in the UK.  Having said that, she could have been on radio or TV and I wouldn't have known anyway.  Seems a missed opportunity.  The website keeps mentioning a promotional video but, hey, that message has been there for nigh on 2 months.  Wonder if she's decided not to try anymore with promotion altogether, and gets no record label support.  I don't think the album charted at all, certainly not top-75.  Not having a single out hasn't helped either.   

[Graham]

Re UK promotion (bit late, this reply!) : the first I heard of Sentimental was when the Guardian newspaper did an interview with TT and this was only about a week before the album came out (!) Prior to that, I had not looked into this forum for several months and I assumed that TT had "retired".

Maybe the lack of UK promotion was partly influenced by the amazingly hostile reviews in the UK music press for most of her work after The Sweet Keeper and the (possibly related) lack of commercial success. Good to see that the first of these problems has been partially overcome for the new album. 

Graham

[PATRYK]

THERE IS SO MUCH MUSICAL CRAP OUT THERE THESE DAYS THAT PERHAPS SOME CRITICS CAME TO THEIR SENSES, WOKE UP AND REALIZED THE MAJOR SINGING AND SONGWRITING TALENT OF TANITA.  GETTING SENTIMENTAL WAS SUCH A WELCOME GIFT. 

PATRYK