The Ultimate Collection - Rick Astley Album Review

Rick Astley

Album Review

20 years on, Stock-Aitken-Waterman man gets a dusting down.

He may well have been a product of the S-A-W ‘hit factory’ in the 80s, but Rick Astley had an amazing voice. With that rich deep voice added to disco beats he became a pop sensation with his smooth Yuppie image synonymous with Maggie Thatcher’s generation. Looking distinctly like a slick city trader (who can forget the mac, or denim shirt and jeans, oh… and the naff shades?), he sucked us onto the dance floor with feelgood hits like Never Gonna Give You Up (1987) and Together Forever (1988), both party favourites still. Now 42, Astley’s rise to fame began as a drummer with Soul band FBI. Spotted by Pete Waterman he was taken under his wing and groomed for chart success eventually releasing Never gonna Give You Up which spent five weeks as a chart-topper becoming the year’s highest selling single. It was the first of 13 world-wide Top 30 singles. Success happened in the States too in 1988 with Never Gonna Give You Up topping the singles chart, followed by Together Forever in June of that year, again topping the chart. In 1989 he was nominated for a Grammy (Best New Artist of the Year), losing out to Tracy Chapman. In a strange move, he released a tasteful cover of Nat King Cole’s When I Fall I Love, which surprisingly made number 2, showing he had the skill to expand his repertoire.

By the end of the decade Astley had parted with the hit factory which began the slump in popularity. His last Top 10 hit was the fabulous love ballad Cry For Help in 1991. Move Right Out (1991) was commercial disaster, sounding like a Hue and Cry jazz-pop.

Follow-up Never Knew Love was also a big commercial failure, peaking at 70. By 1993 it was all over. Hopelessly, appropriately, was a hopeless last shot. In 2005 he released a covers album of Soul standards, Portrait. On it was Don McLean’s Vincent, done up -tempo. It was terrible.

Despite some less impressive later work, Astley’s total world sales have since reached a phenomenal 39.9 million, inclusive of singles, albums and compilations.

This Ultimate Collection has all the UK chart entries.

File under: Get ready to be ‘Rick Rolled’, all over again.

Elly Roberts