Street Talk - Collaboration

This is one of the 'lightest' albums I've heard in quite awhile. Its poppish, catchy and flows with a silky smoothness that no longer exists in the mainstream USA music market. Its two steps away from being pop adult contemporary from the mid 80s. Fredrik Bergh is the mastermind behind Street Talk, and he knows the golden rules of writing catchy AOR, and it shows right away with lush choruses, background vocal heaven, flashy yet tasteful guitar solos, and beautiful keyboard touches sprinkled throughout in the vien of Giuffria and mid 80s Shy with splashes of Journey. While his strongest point is songwriting, he is also a fantastic keyboard player and handles all the keys on this album. Bergh recruits quite a cast of vocalists to share fronting duties on this collection of tunes called "Collaboration", including one of my favorites, Goran Edman, who sings the majority of the vocal songs on the album, coming in with a total of four. Kristian Andren sings three, while Daniel Jonsson covers the eighth one. The other two tracks are snazzy instrumentals, and not filler material in the least. Guitarist Andreas Lidberg is an extremely capable guitar player, and proves his worth by playing his heart out, with firey cascading solos and mesmerizingly sweet riffs.

"In the Eyes of a Woman" is by far the worst track on the album, beginning rather 'heavy' (for this disc atleast), with blistering guitar backed by some unusual percussion, which moves into the vocal sections. The main drawback of the song is the singer's performance, while passable, Jonsson is not in the same league as Goran Edman, but then again, few vocalists are. The song ends up being pretty decent, but the others on the album are just so wonderful, they easily overshadow it. Kristian Andren is given some excellent material to work with here, including the superb opening track "Walk Away From Love", a gigantically plush, mid tempo tune, that brims over with an explosive chorus featuring layer upon layer of swirling keyboards and a host of supporting backing vocals. Its finished off nicely with gorgeous axework, that twists around just to climb upwards to great heights, til fade. Lovely track, that reminds me a good bit of Lou Gramm's solo releases or perhaps even House of Lords. "Brand New Start" is another Andren sung track with another incredibly catchy chorus. This one incorporates some interesting backing vocals that remind me of Bad English and other 80s AOR rock acts. Maybe even a dash of Shy in there somewhere. The guitar solo, again, rings out nice, this time around with a little more bite, despite the fact its a tad shorter than on the opener, but it comes back for an encore to top off the song, with soloing against a background of keys and more electric riffage. Swelling opening for "Could You Be the Only One" reminds me heavily of Foriegner, as the song relaxes into a comfortable, easy going pacing, with little spritzes of keys to spice up the formula.

"Where Does the Love Go" is an elegant tearjerker, with Goran Edman singing with a bluesy softness, his rich, unwavering vocals bring this song up to another level. He is the perfect topping to a backdrop of lapping piano and contrasting vocals to make his lead soar even higher. "If You Say Its Over", shines with a classic feel, reminding me of The Police's "Every Breath You Take", with a freeflowing silkiness. The chorus is a heart stopper, gripping lyrics brought to life by Edman's golden flawless delivery, proving not for the first time, that he's a first class act, and a perfect match for these beautiful songs that bring out his best. Suitably, a little acoustic guitar is used instead of another electric fest to gel it all together. The acoustic take of this song, while interesting to listen to a few times, pales in comparision to the expansive studio version, and feels a little shallow. "Standing in the Rain" is closer to "Where Does the Love Go", and follows the path of pure AOR pop rock, Goran singing like an angel once again.

"Among Friends" and "Borrowed Time" are the two instrumentals. Most instrumentals on releases like these, just feel like fillers to me, structureless flaunting of viruosity, but the two on "Collaboration" both stand on their own nicely. The first features a magnificent melody, and changes between swollen frenetic electric axework and slower, mostly acoustic based passages, that twirl around each other nicely. "Borrowed Time" sees a host of string sounds coming into play, and rounds up to be a dramatic beauty of a track, with emotional, sorrow brimming guitar. This one shoots straight from the soul right into the heart. Just beautiful, and the perfect close to the disc.