Kiki Dee - Stay with Me (1978/2018)

Bill Schnee's production on Kiki Dee's final album for Rocket records is the problem with Stay with Me. None of the passion that Clive Franks and Elton John poured over Loving & Free can be found here, nor the directness and authority Pip Williams gave to 1981's Perfect Timing disc on RCA. Kiki Dee is in good voice, but her originals, like "Don't Stop Loving Me" and "Dark Side of Your Soul," don't go any further than being nice album tracks. It was insightful of this huge crew to take on the Ten Wheel Drive classic, Jerry Ragovoy's "Stay with Me," let alone title the album after that chestnut a year before it would get further recognition. Bette Midler would bring the song to a huge worldwide audience as it became the pivotal moment in The Rose, Janis Joplin/Doors producer Paul Rothchild polishing the pearl, a song of ultimate desperation. There is nothing desperate on this album of glossy adult contemporary music which switches hats too many times. The wild abandon Ten Wheel Drive put behind Genya Ravan's soulful version on their Brief Replies album is absent here. "One Jump Ahead of the Storm" sounds like a watered-down "I've Got the Music in Me," while Tom Snow and Hank Ballard's "One Step" is light '70s dance pop. Cynthia Weil and Franne Golde's "You're Holding Me Too Tight" is out and out disco and is indicative of the project: top-shelf names going through the motions. Kiki Dee's catalog is more important than she's ever been given credit for, from Great Expectations on Motown to the Gus Dudgeon-produced I've Got the Music in Me album. Stay With Me is a perfect example of how the wrong pairing of artist and producer can have drastic results. Davey Johnstone and her longtime keyboard player Bias Boshell's "Love Is a Crazy Feeling" is one of the albums highlights. It and the final track, "Safe Harbor," is worthwhile, but the staggering array of name people, arrangers Marty Paich, Jim Horn, Sonny Burke, Gene Page, keyboard players galore from Tom Snow to James Newton Howard drummers like Jim Keltner and Jeff Porcaro, the presence of Steve Porcaro, Steve Lukather, even the thanks to Jackie DeShannon and Randy Edelman for "stepping in," all go to waste, and an album at an important time in her career, two years after her number one hit with Elton John, misses the mark by a mile. It does feature the best packaging of her music, beautiful photos and jacket design, but none of the momentum of albums that came before and after.