Leona Lewis
Leona Lewis
Christmas, With Love
(Syco)
There's a spectre of Spector on Leona Lewis's seasonal cash-in, although this particular wall of sound has "Simon Woz Ere" sprayed all over the brickwork. A couple of originals - One More Sleep, Mr Right - carefully copy the 1960s Christmas pop model, while a cover of Christmas (Baby Please Come Home) lifts straight from the Spector classic.
Winter Wonderland and I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday are so nosily packed with sound that it's obvious they are designed less for the radio airwaves than the supermarket aisles.
Meanwhile, White Christmas boasts the backing of a Casio keyboard rhythm section and Lewis over-decorating the tune with gaudy vocal baubles: this is the musical equivalent of living next door to someone with a warehouse-worth of electric lights and a neon Santa climbing over the chimney.
The last third plays the religious card (O Holy Night, Silent Night) but for all the technique on show, there's no winter warmth to be had anywhere.
A gospel choir is stuck on like tinsel; sentimentality is scattered like icing sugar. And, particularly as it comes directly after the Wizzard cover, Lewis's operatic rendition of Ave Maria sounds like a choirgirl lost at an office party.
ALAN MORRISON
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article