LOST & FOUND
TURN BACK THE CLOCK
JOHNNY HATES JAZZ
A debonair debut album which proves that when the sheen was being handed out, Johnny Hates Jazz got the lion’s share. However, the cleanliness and slickness of their arrangements and Clark Datchler’s supercool vocals are backed up by some great melodies. Datchler, a precocious teenage singer-songwriter, found standout hooks on the album’s four hits, including the irresistible breakthrough Shattered Dreams and brass-drizzled rewrite of Roxanne, Heart Of Gold. Directionless flop fifth single, Don’t Say It’s Love, and the plodding title track are the weakest here by some distance but remedied by numerous highlights elsewhere. First single Me And My Foolish Heart begins innocuously but quickly becomes a catchy singalong while What Other Reason, a gentle piano tale, is stripped back enough to force full focus on Datchler’s voice. Anti-war hit I Don’t Want To Be A Hero contrasts polish with a dark lyric and Datchler is genuinely affecting on percussive ballad Different Seasons and ambient wine bar track Listen. The album was huge – straight in at No.1 in 1988 – but by the end of its double-platinum stint the following autumn, Datchler had quit. Other incarnations of the band proved unsuccessful but Datchler and fellow original members Calvin Hayes and Mike Nocito reunited in 2009. Hayes then left and illness restricted Datchler’s studio time, so now they’re mainly a touring and festivals duo.