OLIVIA’S BAND OF SURVIVORS
The three singers behind this album of elegant country-pop have all overcome serious illness, turmoil or tragedy to keep their music careers afloat. Olivia Newton-John and Beth Nielsen Chapman are both breast cancer survivors. Canadian singersongwriter Amy Sky has battled publicly with depression and is an active campaigner on mental health issues.
The decision to share some of their stories in song is a bold one, and Liv On performs a delicate balancing act as it addresses challenging issues while exploring more universal themes of loss and hope.
The trio sometimes overplay their hand by tugging a little too heavily at the heartstrings, but all three singers are also subtle, sensitive songwriters whose words are capable of packing a hefty emotional punch.
Out this week, the album veers unashamedly towards the acoustic, singer-songwriter fare of the early Seventies. Its arrangements are dominated by easy-listening strings, tasteful piano and lilting, pedalsteel guitar.
But the vocal performances, underpinned by the trio’s spellbinding harmonies, are a passionate testimony to the healing power of music.
Olivia Newton-John is the most recognisable name here, and she takes the lead on four of the album’s 11 original songs.
The British-born singer, 68, set pulses racing when she played Spandex-clad Sandy and sang You’re The One That I Want with John Travolta in 1978’s Grease. Despite initial reservations from the Nashville establishment, she has since made a successful transition to country music, and strikes an appropriately comforting tone here.
her singing is warm and expressive on the mature ballads Impossible and Grace And Gratitude. Only the title track, complete with a choir and a clunky key change, feels overcooked.
BeTh Nielsen Chapman made her name writing for Faith hill and Bette Midler, but the 58-year-old Texan is an accomplished country singer and guitarist in her own right, and the reprise of her 1997 single Sand And Water is Liv On’s outstanding moment.
Written about her husband ernest Chapman, who died of cancer in 1994, the song makes clear her intention to carry on bringing up the couple’s only child alone while dealing with her grief.
It’s such a powerful, life-affirming piece of music that it’s easy to see why elton John, as good a judge of a great song as anyone, introduced it into his live repertoire within months of its original release 20 years ago.
As the threesome’s least
well-known member, Amy Sky is the album’s real revelation.
The 56-year-old from Toronto, who has worked with Newton-John before, plays piano and arranges many of the album’s string parts.
She also uses her impressive vocal range to sing the soaring lead lines on the sorrowful Forever Blue and piano ballad Immortality, which adds music to American writer Mary Elizabeth Frye’s 1932 poem Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep.
Many of Liv On’s best tracks, though, feature all three women in unison. The tender My Heart Goes Out To You opens the album with superb, barbershop-style harmonies. Energetic country rocker Stone In My Pocket brings a welcome lightness of touch.
The album’s only jarring moment is the Christmas number There’s Still My Joy. Its inclusion might have made sense when this collection came out in Newton-John’s adopted homeland of Australia three months ago, but its continued presence on this UK release is misplaced.
It’s a rare blip, though. In pooling their considerable talents, the trio wanted to convey messages of compassion and hope. Thanks to some spirited performances, Liv On does just that.