527. Eurythmics - Sweet Dreams (Are Made Of This) (1983)
















Track Listing

1. Love Is a Stranger
2. I've Got an Angel
3. Wrap It Up
4. I Could Give You (A Mirror)
5. Walk
6. Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)
7. Jennifer
8. This Is the House
9. Somebody Told Me
10. This City Never Sleeps

Review

Annie Lennox never sounded as frigid and unapproachable and angry as she does here again. There's an almost Grace Jonesy feel to her delivery, but fortunately with a lot more nuances to it, and that only makes this album the best ever to come out of the Eurythmics. The delivery works perfectly in the songs, making the album a great one indeed.

Of course the big highlight here is Sweet Dreams, that even with all the covers that were made of it has not lost any of its power in the original. Of course some people seem to forget the other side of the Eurythmics, Dave Stewart is a brilliant musician who complements Annie's vocals perfectly.

This is an album which has definitely been much imitated in style, but never bettered, therefore as an example of hard electro-synth-pop it is up there with Soft Cell, maybe just one little step down.

Track Highlights

1. Sweet Dreams (Are Made OF This)
2. Love Is A Stranger
3. I Could Give You (A Mirror)
4. The Walk

Final Grade

9/10

Trivia

From Wikipedia:

Stewart, together with Robert Crash and ex-The Selector bassist Adam Williams, produced the album in Eurythmics' own relatively primitive 8-track studio, winning awards for the quality of the end-result which belied its low-budget origins. Sweet Dreams saw the duo move away from the psychedelic, guitar-tinged band-orientated sound of In the Garden, instead focusing on raw analogue synthesizers (including the Oberheim OB1 and EDP Wasp) and drum machines (particularly the Movement Systems Drum Computer, which featured a graphic visual display of the drum patterns). Whilst the "synth pop" genre had grown in popularity in the preceding years, it was often associated with all male groups and somewhat clinical, emotionless music. Eurythmics (particularly with Lennox's vocal stylings) brought a soul music twist to the electronic sound, which proved popular with broader audiences.

There is no embeddable Sweet Dreams, so here you get Love Is a Stranger: