Released: June 2
With three decades of chart smashes under her belt, Louise revisits a lifetime in pop on her career-spanning ‘Greatest Hits’ collection.
Coinciding with the 30th anniversary of Eternal’s 1993 debut, the singer – who enjoyed two years of global success with the band before breaking away and launching her solo career in 1995 – brings together highlights from both careers to mark her latest milestone.
Sequenced in reverse chronology, the album opens with recent radio hit Super Magic; a collaboration with songwriter and producer Steve Anderson that harks back to mid-eighties and wouldn’t sound out of place on any of Five Star’s classic LPs.
Covering gospel (High Hopes), reggaeton (Right Now) and funk (Feel), the original material spans the breadth of Louise’s catalogue, touching on numerous reference points from across her four solo albums while showcasing her ageless vocals.
It’s commonplace for artists to sequence this kind of release from past to present – with additional tracks tacked on to the end – but Louise’s ‘Greatest Hits’ does the opposite and emphasises the strength of her more recent material from 2020 comeback ‘Heavy Love’, before segueing through Top 10 classics like 2 Faced, Let’s Go Round Again, Arms Around The World and Naked.
Aligning nicely with current chart trends that are increasingly leaning into the sounds of decades gone by, Louise’s classics hold up today and conjure memories of a treasured era in British pop, while a series of reimagined recordings of her own hits and songs from the Eternal songbook offer an alternative perspective, via the lens of 2023, and introduce her material to a new generation.
Of the new versions, her takes on the group’s debut Stay and Just A Step From Heaven prove she was always destined to be front and centre, while Naked gets a slick electronic makeover and In Walked Love is reworked as an all-out dance track that might soon trade places as the definitive version.
Closing the double disc set is a cover of Janet Jackson’s Together Again that, at first listen, adds little to the overall ‘Greatest Hits’, but given Louise’s admiration for the superstar, feels oddly fitting as her own little celebration of a Lewisham girl’s fulfilment of a long-held dream to make it as a pop star and a thank you to the fans who’ve supported her along the way.
Thirty years in the music business is no mean feat, but whether it’s her impeccable nineties chart run or surprise comeback after almost two decades away, ‘Greatest Hits’ is just further proof that Louise is one of the UK’s most enduring pop stars.
‘Greatest Hits’ is out June 2 via BMG/Tag8.
