release date: Jun. 15, 1987
formats: cd (2004 remaster)
[album rate: 4 / 5] [3,82]
produced by: Corrado Rustici
label: Polydor / Universal - nationality: Italy
Track highlights: 2. "Con le mani" (4 / 5) - 3. "Pippo" - 4. "Dune mosse" - 5. "Bambino io, bambino tu" - 6. "Non ti sopporto più" (4 / 5) - 7. "Senza una donna" (5 / 5) - 9. "Hey Man" - 10. "Solo una sana e consapevole libidine salva il giovane dallo stress e dall'Azione Cattolica" (org. video) - 11. "Hai scelto me"
4th studio album by Zucchero follows one year after Rispetto and is released under the name of 'Zucchero Sugar Fornaciari'. Most songs are written and composed solely by Zucchero - only tracks #2, #5 & #9 are co-written by Gino Paoli, track#4 is written with Marco Figliè, and track #5 is co-composed with Albino Mammoliti and Raymond Jones. The album was already in late '87 issued in a Christmas version ['versione natalizia'] with a different front cover but with the same original tracklist. However, the optical issues featured two bonus tracks (tracks #8 & #12).
Blue's continues very much in the style of his '86 album with an even stronger presence of a blues rock ingredient. I just think this has several songs of higher quality, and it basically sounds like a "best of" compilation, which I initially mistook it for. The album is Zucchero's first of ten [10!] consecutive studio albums to top the Italian album charts, and it's his first to have en entry outside of Italy. The album peaked at number #43 in the Netherlands and as number #18 in Switzerland where it sold Platinum.
Two singles where released from the album: track #2 and #7 peaking at number #27 and #17 respectively; however, "Senza una donna" would become his first number #1 single-hit and best-selling single ever, when it was re-recorded with Paul Young and released as single in '91. It's also included on Zucchero's first compilation album Zucchero from '90 as well as Paul Young's compilation From Time to Time (1991) and that version of the song is one of of the top-3 best-selling Italian songs ever released.
Note: The front cover is the photography "7th Day Adventists" (aka 'Male Voice Choir Seventh Day Adventists Church Holoway, London') by Neal Slavin taken from his book "Britons" (1986).
This is really Zucchero on top of his career with brilliant songwriting and tight pop soul and blues, and it comes close to the style of Joe Cocker and Paul Young, "only" difference is that Zucchero is an artist, who writes his own material.
I think, this is his clearly best album so far.
Highly recommended.
