Virgin
Pop, 1999

Okay, I confess. I’m a big Belinda Carlisle fan. I know every word to every one of her songs in the 1980’s and I even have a silly dance especially for Summer Rain. I know, it’s a shameful confession, which is why you won’t see me playing this CD except when nobody is around.

Oh, who am I kidding? Come on, when it comes to rousing singalong pop tunes with the catchiest killer choruses ever, Belinda Carlisle’s your woman. At least until the 1990s when somehow her music becomes tired and bland.

So what if people say she sings like a sheep? Leave a Light on, Heaven is a Place on Earth, Circle in the Sand, Summer Rain… I can go on and on. These are all great pop songs. You hear them once, you’ll hum them until your tonsils wear out. You’ll want to have Live Your Life Be Free played on your birthday and funeral. People will deny ever knowing you.

Of course, I have complains too. Where are my favorite ballads Half the World and Vision of You? And where’s the singer’s first hit Mad About You? And I would have given this album five oogies were not for the inclusion of the boring tracks from Ms Carlisle’s post-late-1990s day. The party stops after Little Black Book and everything after that’s a filler to drive the guests out of my house.

Still, great one. Everybody hold hands – I insist – and ready? Oh my love it’s you that I dream of, oh my love since that day…