The Shadows - Change Of Address (1980) [Vinyl]

Review by Dave Thompson
First, the album title. After no less than 23 years at EMI, first on the Columbia subsidiary and then on the parent label, the Shadows upped and switched to Polydor in 1980. Change of Address was the first fruit of the new union, but thankfully the address was all that had changed. Anybody who picked up on the band in 1975 following their Eurovision inspired reunion would have walked into this new record knowing what to expect, and would probably have been pleased to find it -- a dozen tracks that took the usual approach of mixing lighthearted band originals with a few familiar covers, nothing too demanding, nothing exhausting, just another drifting soundtrack for your next cocktail party. When it's good, it's great. As usual, the vocal tracks tend to serve more as light relief than anything else. But a sweet version of Fleetwood Mac's "Albatross" makes you wish they could have recorded it back in the 1960s, so effortlessly does it blend the original's stately magic with their own twanging glee, while there's also an unexpected dip into the Jean-Michel Jarre songbook, and a version of "Oxygene 5" which, in replacing the Frenchman's synths with guitars, proves just what a timeless melody Jarre composed.