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Deborah Cox
ULTIMATE
(BMG)
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Of all the chanteuses who have chosen to work in the dance-music idiom these past 15 years, Ontario’s Deborah Cox has enjoyed the most success, and all of her hits are compiled here. The bad news is that they too often disappoint. Cox’s voice is the problem: it has neither Loleatta Holloway’s pyrotechnic highs nor Diana Ross’s warmth nor Donna Summer’s cool, and in a house-music context, it lacks the husky intoxication of Crystal Waters, the weirdness of Liz Torres, the companionable warmth of Ultra Nate, and the lush gospel scream of Barbara Tucker. Cox sings straight up, without frills, contravening the fuss and floss that gives house music its emotional muscle. She doesn’t digress or deviate from the target, doesn’t serrate the music with melisma; her soprano rides the rhythm and rises to the occasion when called to do so. If only she didn’t sound so darned businesslike! What she does have are expressive lyrics that prove one more time Berry Gordy’s adage about getting him songs, not singers. Fans will enjoy the "Dance Mix" of "Things Just Ain’t the Same"; radio programmers can handle the hip-hop heat of "It Could’ve Been You," the choral melodicism of her big hits "Who Do U Love" and "Sentimental," the trance orchestration in "Up & Down (In & Out)." The most evocative trance track is the "Valentin Mix" of "Something Happened on the Way to Heaven"; memorable too is "Same Script, Different Cast," a he-lied-to-me ballad in which Cox duets with Whitney Houston, a performance that may remind some disco fans of Donna Summer and Barbra Streisand in "No More Tears."
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