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An album called Spin that you will not be able to stop playing!
"Can a piece of me flow through you" asks Darren Hayes in the title track of his album Spin. For me that is exactly what his music does.
The album has many different moods,the fun remincence of Crush (1980me), the anger in Heart Attack & Dirty, the the vulnerablity of Good Enough, wanting to be just that. I love the way this song begins gently & quietly with the emotional break out at the end.
There are of course love songs. Some are quiet, gentle ones (I Miss You, Can't Ever Get Enough of You, Like it or Not), the sort of ballads Darren Hayes is famous for & that he writes so beautifully. With Insatiable he shows us a different style of love song. The lyrics & the gorgeous falsetto are super sexy. It is a unique song & one that only a truly superb voice can carry off. Creepin' Up On You is a more upbeat love song describing a very obsessive kind of love.
The live acoustic tracks if you can get hold of the special UK edition with the extra CD are fabulous, especially Good Enough.
The track Spin talks about how "your problems don't exist when the music feels like this" & for me when I am listening to this album they truly don't. I have listened to it over & over. I cannot wait for the next piece of Hayes magic to come out hopefully later this year.
I know that my words cannot do justice to this album & the music itself will say it all so much better.
Darren Hayes' Spin - Something for Everyone
My personal analysis of the Spin CD: 5 stars out of 5 stars = THE BEST THING!! Some songs fit more than one category - I have broken them down as follows: For those in love: Insatiable, I Miss You, I Cant Ever Get Enough of You For those longing for love again after a break up: Like It or Not, The Heart Wants What It Wants, I Miss You For those who have had relationships gone bad: Strange Relationship, Heart Attack Songs with meaning (social commentary, etc): Spin, Good Enough To make you go on the dance floor and dance for a long time: Crush, Creeping up on You, What You Like To make you "want to do it" if you know what I mean/needing a cold shower, a good perv, etc: Insatiable, Dirty, What You Like I have listened a great deal to the cd before breaking the songs into categories. Darren truly writes so brilliantly for all people no matter what situations you have had in your life, there is a song on the record that fits it in some way. I know that the "Affirmation" album had more songs about relationships gone bad (Hold Me, The Lover After Me, I Don't Know You Anymore and songs with social commentary/meaning (Crash & Burn, Affirmation). I can tell Darren has grown as a songwriter since the release of Affirmation, and I am sure his interactions with his family, friends, and fans certainly influenced the SPIN cd a great deal. I am sure all of them will be a great influence on future work he does. When I was listening to the cd, I can tell that he was influenced by many great performers of the past. No other singer's voice can influence me or my moods the way Darren's does. I am sure if you put on cd of any of the following after listening to Darren's SPIN - you can make a comparison but Darren certainly does have a voice of angel that is all his own too. I am sure that people like Bono, Smokey Robinson, Prince, and Michael Jackson would be flattered that a young artist like Darren is being compared to them in terms of vocal quality and song writing quality. And if Marvin Gaye was still alive, I am sure he would be flattered as well. I have to say this cd will have a proud place in my collection among my many cds and will be heavily played for years to come.... I highly recommend it - it was worth the wait to hear the Voice of An Angel with a sexy & sultry sound ALL HIS OWN!!!!
Spin
Darren Hayes knows the vocabulary of heartbreak.
On his first solo album, "Spin"-- referring to life's seemingly endless karmic cycles and revolutions-- he shows a kaleidoscope of styles, from the edgy, slightly cynical R&B groove of Strange Relationship, to the lush Latin-tinged seduction of Insatiable, the angry, accusatory but damn-it's-great-to-dance-to beat of Heart Attack, to the giddy paranoia of Creepin Up On You, to the sheer joyful escapist nostalgia of Crush (1980 ME), each of the tracks is crafted to reveal another aspect of this artist's creativity. And another page in the songbook he's been adding to at a furious pace since his early days with Savage Garden, when he collaborated with multi-instrumentalist Daniel Jones.
This is a whole new place from which to write. New attitude. New collaboration. New retro-electronic and techno signatures that defy the usual chill of that medium, and inject (as Hayes describes it) soul into the machine.
There is soul here, no mistake.
Hayes is best known for his searching and poetic lyrics, and the images of Spin take us on a metaphorical ride that veers all over the emotional map. The album is by turns light and dark, bitter and sweet, full of hope and charged with regret. But it's in the portrayal of lost love that Hayes finds his surest, safest harbour.
I Miss You is a soft, easy-to-love ode to a new relationship and all its promise.
Good Enough is a slow and sure groove from insecurity to self-acceptance, a classic our kids should sing on the way to school.
I Can't Ever Get Enough Of You is the Spanish guitar-accented confession every lover longs to hear.
And Like It or Not, in this reviewer's opinion the sorrowful showpiece of the album, is a masterly exploration of what-if, could-have-been, and why-didn't-I. The vocal work in this song is stunning, soul-deep, and palpably honest. Hayes has a gift. You believe everything he tells you. MORE than believe.... you live in his head for the few minutes it takes to listen. It's a fascinating, complex, sometimes contradictory place to be.
The last track on the album, the title track Spin, gives us a good, solid, trip-hopping finale that lifts the spirit and kicks butt at the same time. It's a celebration of the place of music in our lives and its power to move, create, and change us. No mean accomplishment, that.
This is an album that will live on my turntable (and yes, I use the early 80's term advisedly... because, here, it just feels right!) for the forseeable future. Or at least until Hayes' next venture arrives on the scene.
Spin - Darren Hayes
Released in April 2002, this album took the UK by surprise, with its unusual blend of an 80s inspired track (Crush 1980 Me), and Soft ballads for which Mr Hayes is better known, and even a little rapping on the title Track! This album showed the emergence of a great lyricist combined with a fantastic voice... and the second album, The Tension and the Spark, due out soon, will show that Darren Hayes will be with us for a long time to come!!