Soldier of Love - Sade

A review of Soldier of Love, the 6th studio album from Sade. Soldier of Love was released in the UK on February 8th 2010 and is available in physical format and as a download. Expect to pay around £7 for either version. The track listing is identical on each.

A Very Smooth Operator

In the 1980s, the album charts were dominated by a rather unassuming R&B group. Named Sade after the Nigerian lead singer, the group had four successful studio albums throughout the 1980s and into the early 1990s and defined a different sound in an era that was widely regarded for more electronic, synth-based music. There was something unquestionably exotic about Sade. It was partly the silky, lush vocals of the lead vocalist, but it was about more than just one singer. Sade incorporated warm, sensual melodies into subtle, soulful love songs that probably accompanied more candlelit suppers than any bottle of Beaujolais. Sade never sold huge volumes of singles. Astoundingly, only Your Love Is King, their debut single in the UK, made the top 10, but many of their songs remain era classics to this day, notably Smooth Operator, which has featured in countless film soundtracks and somehow fails to age a single day.

Despite being relatively prolific throughout the 1980s, the band decided to retire in the 1990s. Lead vocalist Sade Adu was notoriously strict about maintaining privacy for her family and her decision to withdraw from the market was strongly motivated by her desire to raise a family. After the fourth studio album in 1992, the band ceased to record any more music until they reformed in 2000. Ten years later, the group once again recorded a new album, to a rapturous reception from fans and critics alike.

If You Set Me Free, I Will Run

Soldier of Love is, arguably, not particularly removed from Sade’s previous output. Arranged briefly across ten tracks (relatively unusual in the current climate) Soldier of Love is a sombre, sultry and characteristically understated collection that represents the musical equivalent of sitting in front of an open log fire. There’s comfort to be drawn from the fact that Sade haven’t really changed. Adu’s voice (now 51 years old) has barely changed a shred in the ten years since we last heard from her and the overall sound of Soldier of Love is comforting in itself. Laid back, chilled out grooves and subtle musical arrangement is the order of the day here and it’s fair to say that in the ‘candlelit supper’ market, there are few others that can emulate the style of Sade.

Each of the ten tracks was written and produced almost exclusively by the members of the band and there’s something protective and intimate about the sound here. This isn’t an album that tries to be anything other than what it is that Sade love to be. It’s almost as though the disc was recorded as a private session, and the album release was a secondary consideration, allowing the band to share some of its intimate secrets with a waiting audience. Soldier of Love proves that whereas other bands and artists feel a constant need and pressure to re-invent themselves, bands like Sade are so affirmed in what it is that they do, there’s really no need to deviate.

What that doesn’t mean, however, is that this is something that we’ve all heard before, because that simply isn’t true. Soldier of Love dwells on different themes and generally has a different mood to earlier Sade albums, reflecting, perhaps on the increased maturity of the band members and the different places in which they find themselves. The likes of Diamond Life and Promise were, for example, unashamedly romantic. Soldier of Love, however, has a rather more sombre sound to it. Sade’s ‘get up and go’ hasn’t ‘got up and gone’ but it certainly doesn’t have the passion it once did.

Long Hard Road

It has to be said that Adu’s vocal range has always been limited. Never a singer to push the boundaries, Adu’s material caters for a voice that has defined limits and as the ten tracks unfold here, it runs the risk of starting to wash over you. The album suffers from a lack of memorable, likeable melodies, and whilst the overall mood is appealing in a relaxing, meditating kind of way, the risk is that one track starts to blend into the next. The tempo of each track struggles to increase beyond (or below) a certain point, and there’s little to distinguish each of the songs here. There are exceptions to this, of course. Opening track The Moon and the Sky starts with a haunting string arrangement that seems to lure the listener in like some kind of supernatural force and is arguably one of the strongest tracks on the album. Ironically, by the time you’ve reached track six, Be That Easy, you find yourself yearning for something to come along and wake things up a little, which really only leads to further disappointment.

It’s true to say that you have to be in the right mood for Soldier of Love. This isn’t an album that complements every mood. Indeed, this was almost destined to be background music. It’s just not decisive enough to stand up to a more demanding environment. That in itself isn’t a problem (music is very often the perfect accompaniment to so many things) but does go some way to explain the fact that the album did relatively good numbers in the album chart, and has failed to even scrape the singles chart. It doesn’t help that the tracks selected aren’t perhaps the strongest representation. The military-sounding percussion of Soldier of Love, for example, is vaguely interesting, but the song isn’t the best showcase for Adu’s vocals and occasionally seems to fall rather flat. The Moon and The Sky would almost certainly have had a bigger impact on the radio and the follow-up, Babyfather, is even less appealing. The fusion of gentle reggae sounds, along with a curious vocal about a father figure doesn’t really make any connection here and the song has yet to even dent the top 200.

Themes

The Sade of the 1980s came at a time when the economy was strong and the world was seen as a relatively hopeful place. Songs like Smooth Operator were the perfect accompaniment to the ‘yuppies’ of the era and it’s curious to see how the mood of Sade’s music has shifted. Soldier of Love suggests that love is now a conflict, a definite contrast to the love that was ‘making my soul sing’ in the 1980s. But the resilience reflects well on the band’s approach to music here. Soldier of Love is a darker, rather more serious album than earlier material but connects well with a time when the climate is gloomy, economically and in many ways socially.

There’s something rather retrospective about Soldier of Love. Songs like ‘In Another Time’ reflect on events of the past, rather than that hopeful aspiration of love and romance. Lyrics like ‘in another time girl, your tears won’t leave a trace' are, perhaps, a more realistic reflection of love, loss and heartache and if you listen closely, Soldier of Love runs the risk of becoming a rather depressing experience. There is, however, an inherent aspiration for the future here that betrays the slightly morose tone of this album. ‘Long Hard Road’ might sound like a struggle, but there’s a positive message to be taken here, with such wise words as ‘here I could stay but I’ll keep moving on’.

There’s a definite maturity to the sound and the lyrics here. These are not simple songs and if you’ve the will to listen closely, you’ll be left to find your own personal interpretation for many of them. ‘Bring Me Home’ is perhaps lyrically the most complex song on the whole album and ranges from sublime to awkward. ‘I’ve cried for the lives I’ve lost, like a child in need of love’ points beautifully to an inherent longing, which is then crushed against a strange lyric that says ‘the small step I need to take is a mountain, stretched out like a lazy dog.’

Final Verdict

It’s difficult to know how to ‘feel’ about this album. There’s something deep and reassuring about a vocalist whose sound seems barely to have changed in over twenty years and that’s one of Soldier of Love’s most redeeming qualities. There’s a welcome familiarity to this that transcends years of X-Factor styled pop singers and reminds us of a band that has stayed true to its musical roots throughout. Soldier of Love is unquestionably sensual and if it had the energy it would virtually demand that you slip into something comfortable, pour yourself a glass of wine and luxuriate in front of an open fire.

Conversely, however, it’s a rather difficult beast to tame and Soldier of Love is an extremely difficult disc with which to make a connection. The intimacy of the production here is almost exclusive, as though you’ve stumbled onto a sound you were never really supposed to share and this is one of the least accessible albums from a group that was previously loved and admired by a large number of people. Where some listeners will find soul and sensuality, others will find sobriety and standoffishness, all of which makes for a very awkward combination. Realistically, if you get the mood and the moment wrong, Soldier of Love is frequently bland and uninspiring and like anything connected to the heart, this album requirea careful handling. Only you can decide whether this Soldier of Love is worth fighting for.

Track Listing

1. The Moon and the Sky
2. Soldier of Love
3. Morning Bird
4. Babyfather
5. Long Hard Road
6. Be That Easy
7. Bring Me Home
8. In Another Time
9. Skin
10. The Safest Place

For a taster of tracks off the album, you can check out the band's website at http://www.sade.com/gb/home/