Search - Bucks Fizz :: Bucks Fizz

Let's get Fizzical

T. Kavanagh | Ireland | 07/12/2004

(3 out of 5 stars)

"It was inevitable that an album designed to capitalise on the success of Eurovision winner, "Making Your Mind Up," would be an inoffensive froth of feel-good pop. The bulk of the original album delivers on the cheery pop sensibilities of their first two singles but there were also hints of the greater and more substantial things to come. Third single, "One Of Those Nights" was, by far, the best song of the set and the most effective of the ballads on offer here. The funkier edge of "Took It To The Limit" was a welcome foil to the overall perkiness and could have held its head high on some of the group's later - and better - albums. Honourable mention, too, for the bubbling disco bounce of "Shine On" and the vaguely ABBAesque "Lady Of The Night." To these ears, the running order seems a little odd: the original side 2 (tracks 6-10) would have worked better as the opening set. As debut albums go, "Bucks Fizz" is competent and fun but, essentially, unremarkableUltimately, the bonus material points the way forward. The contemporary B-sides live down to their status and the Spanish language tracks are interesting but it is the later recordings that show how well the group developed and achieved their potential. The previously unreleased 1985 track, "I Used To Love The Radio," a refreshingly jaunty pop take on the nuclear-apocalypse lyrical fad of the era, significantly ups the ante. Ultimately, however, everything else on the disc is eclipsed by two of the group's finest ever tracks - "Love In A World Gone Mad" and "Heart Of Stone": the big hits that (incredibly) got away."