Heaven 17 – Naked As Advertised (Versions '08)

Ironically the label that released this album says it all. Once there was zero as a limit, now it's absolute zero. While it's always interesting to hear how a certain group would revisit their body of work (The Cure, Kraftwerk and Cabaret Voltaire did an interesting job on theirs), sadly for the trio-come-duo which did great earlier on, bordering on the avant-garde, turned into its own worst enemy now forever lost between its past, present and future. Most material since "Pleasure One" preferred style over substance and this, Heaven 17's revisitation of their classic songs with a few other people's songs added in the list, shows no particular skill in delivering the goods. Of course, many fans will defend it and give it a chance but I truly doubt I'd ever prefer this over the originals.

When the original League split up, there was a struggle between the two camps - Phil Oakey reformed the group and scored a multi-seller that was "Dare", while Ian Marsh and Martyn Ware stayed closer to the experimental side of things with their first BEF album/cassette and Heaven 17's amazing debut album with Glenn Gregory. There was bitching about who's got brains and who's got the looks, and to an extent, Heaven 17 sounded way more original and skillful but at some point their luck changed. The Human League today are far more clever teaming up with the generation of electroclash while Heaven 17 sunk into euro-dance banality.

"Being Boiled" already suffered on "Travelogue", so why bother remaking it into a shell technologically even emptier, sounding further more like "Being Bored"... Further on, a number of classics suffer painfully for the same reason - "Geisha Boys And Temple Girls" is more upbeat but just as flat, and again there is "Temptation", the ultimate albatross around Heaven 17's neck, here pushed further down the test tube, ruined by the exaggerated backing vocals that continue devouring every song for mere demonstration of "soul" - a dreadful disco-esque version of "Penthouse And Pavement", all-over-the-place version of "Fascist Groove Thang", the cheap techno of "We Live So Fast" (here the only thing missing to fully ruin it are Mr. C's raps)...

The only two examples where the duo truly delivers are "Don't Fall (the finest moment on the album) and the slower take of "Empire State Human" (delivered in a "Circus Of Death" mode) - the latter a good idea that Glenn Gregory delivers a spoken word instead of blindly following the original by singing. Sure his voice was always superb and stays fit to the present day but instead of keeping his trademark cool delivery, most of Gregory's vocal deliveries here sound forced. Heaven 17's version of "Party Fears Two" is certainly a daring piano ballad-type cover of The Associates' classic, if only it don't put you to sleep half way down the song...

Too bad the group which always looked forward to develop technically, sadly never outgrew their ambition to compete - in this case, by updating (their own) songs for update's sake... and as much as they enjoyed the experience, the overall effect of "As Naked As Advertised" is that of a lifeless, forgettable collection...