Together With Cliff Richard

Having hit the U.K. chart with a suitably themed single every Christmas for the past three years, Cliff Richard celebrated the 1991 festivities with his second album dedicated wholly to carols and the like, but his first through EMI — 1988's Carols, of course, appeared on the specialist Christian label Word. Two of those recent hits, the chart-topping "Mistletoe and Wine" and "Saviour's Day," were included (the exception, "Whenever God Shines His Light," was a duet with Van Morrison, released under the latter's name), alongside the 1982 hit "Little Town (Of Bethlehem)," reprised from Carols. Two further tracks from this album, "We Should Be Together" and "This New Year" would soon be racing up the listings in their own right. The remainder of the set is divided between original material and traditional favorites, ruthlessly rearranged for modern listening fashions and not necessarily successfully so — not unless you really need to hear "Silent Night" masquerading as an Ultravox-y electro-wash burble, or "Venite (O Come All Ye Faithful)" transformed into a tribal-lite Toto outtake. But "White Christmas" is rendered pleasantly faithfully, while "Mistletoe and Wine" is surely set to prove as inescapable for future festive revelers as Irving Berlin's greatest hit is today. So, Together With Cliff Richard is not an essential album, even for confirmed Christmas lovers. But with a few eggnogs inside you, and a warm glow emanating to the furthest extremities, it's certainly an improvement on whatever seasonal stuffings the latest teenybopper sensation has in store for you and, who knows, if you've been especially good this year, Santa might bring you another Cliff Richard record this Christmas as well.