Cheap Emotion (Music) (Barbra Streisand) Price

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Customer Reviews of Emotion

Let's hear the bad news first: two of Streisand's worst songs are to be found here. "You're A Step In the Right Direction" is a nightmare. I was embarrassed to listen to Barbra try to imitate John Mellencamp (who wrote the music to this track). Barbra, we love you the way you are, please don't try to be someone else. The other howler, "When I Dream," suffers from laughable lyrics, an out-of-place bridge, and back up vocals that almost drown out Streisand.

"Time Machine" sounds as if it were made by computers who were fed on every feel-good love anthem of the last twenty years, while "Best That I Could" and "Clear Sailing" are pleasent, but utterly forgettable tunes.

The up beat title track "Emotion" (featuring back up by the Pointer Sisters) and the mid tempo "Heart Don't Change My Mind" (one of the better songs written by Dianne Warren) are both charming, if slightly dated, numbers.

Better yet, however is that EMOTION features three Streisand classics. "Left In the Dark" is beautifully written Jim Steinman epic that features a nicely restrained vocal and "Make No Mistake, He's Mine" is terrific duet with Kim Carnes where the contrast between the two very different singers' vocals is put to great effect. The album closes with "Here We Are At Last" which is a wonderful love song (music written by Streisand) that is so good it almost makes you forget some of the album's low points. Almost, that is.

Every artist releases a dud every now and then and this happens to be one of Streisand's few. While the three great songs will make this mandatory for Streisand fans, everyone else should stick to her much, much better offerings.

Babs pop album
This is a mixed bag, and not one of Barbra Streisand's best albums. Her first contemporary pop album since the extremely successful 1980 album GUILTY. On 1984's EMOTION, she works with 9 different producers, and the result is a very uneven album. This album has some of her worst songs, including "You're A Step In The Right Direction", which features music written by John Mellencamp and lyrics written by Babs herself, is regretfully awful. "Time Machine" is another dud, as is "When I Dream". They are all pretty forgettable, or at least you'll want to forget them. There's some nice ballads, like "Here We Are At Last", where Barbra wrote the music for it. "Clear Sailing" is another nice one. "Heart Don't Change My Mind" is a really nice Diane Warren song. Ultimately, the best tracks on this album are the singles. The title track is a nice uptempo dance type song, with background vocals from the Pointer Sisters. The duet with Kim Carnes is fabulous, "Make No Mistake (He's Mine)", their distinct voices work together on this great song. The epic "Left In The Dark" is also a highlight, which was produced by Jim Steinman, it's a great epic ballad. Overall, not her strongest, there's a handful of good songs but for the most part it's a forgettable album.

I'd love it if Barbra does another album in this vein.
1984's Emotion is commonly regarded as one of the least successful albums of La Streisand's career (peaking at #19 and spawning no top 40 singles), but I think as a fan of 80's pop, this is one of my favorite albums of her career. Only liking Guilty, Lazy Afternoon, Wet and The Broadway Album more.

In this album, you see how versatile she is. She has a great 80's rock song (Step In The Right Direction), a funky mid-80's dance number (the title track), a duet with the underrated Kim Carnes and also a hot Jim Steinman number that rivals Total Eclipse Of The Heart (Left In The Dark). There is nothing on this album as classic as Woman In Love, Somewhere or Evergreen, but even if you're not a fan of Barbra, if you like 80's pop, there's a chance you will love this album.

As someone who feels she has been going through the motions after Broadway Album, I'd love to see Babs return to this sort of pop.