Released: 26 February 2021
Rating: ****
Bonnie Tyler’s trademark raspy vocals scored her chart hits with classics like It’s a Heartache, Total Eclipse of the Heart and Holding Out for a Hero, and on her latest LP she insists ‘The Best is Yet to Come.
It’s a bold statement from a singer 45 years into their career, but with a return to pop rock, combining welcome nostalgia with the star’s weathered vocals, Bonnie’s 18th album is her strongest since the late ‘80s.
Opener and title track, The Best is Yet to Come, sets the tone for the collection, featuring pulsing synths and a harmony-laden, sing-along chorus that proves irresistible.
The formula triumphs, with Dreams Are Not Enough and Hungry Hearts keeping up the energy, while the rockier Stuck To My Guns – with its opening pan flutes and Western-influenced landscape – darkens the tone while defying you not to sing along.
‘The Best is Yet to Come’ features eight original songs, plus four cover versions – Somebody’s Hero by C.B. Green, I’m Only Guilty (Of Loving You) previously recorded by Chick Willis and Tab Benoit, I’m Not in Love by 10cc and Catch the Wind by Donovan – with Bonnie’s distinctive tone embodying each track and making it her own.
The record is split in two halves; Side A is packed with stadium-ready anthems, while a more mellow Side B offers a stripped-back, more intimate selection of tracks, allowing her vocals to shine.
What’s most impressive, perhaps, about ‘The Best is Yet to Come’, is the reunion between Bonnie and producer David Mackay – who previously worked with the star on her first two albums, ‘The World Starts Tonight’ and ‘Natural Force’, and singles including It’s a Heartache and Lost in France.
It’s a pairing that, more than four decades on, is meant to be, with the caliber of songs superb and a reinvigorated Bonnie sounding rested, strong and raring to go.
Back in 2019, Bonnie’s last album, ‘Between the Earth and the Stars’, saw her return to the UK Top 40 for the first time in 33 years and, if there’s any justice in the musical world, she’ll climb even higher this time around.
If ‘The Best is Yet to Come’ is her strongest album since 1988’s ‘Hide your Heart’, we can’t wait to see what’s next for Bonnie Tyler.
‘The Best is Yet to Come’ is out now.
