18 Til I Die (1996) Review by Karl Watson

This was an interesting time in BA’s career. Gone was the boy next door with the jeans and t-shirt. In came the silk shirts, fake glasses and greasy hair. And lots of colour. The live show also featured the biggest production to date (excluding the Slane ’00 gig). The bridge on the stage, the b-stage, the giant underwear, the models during “The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You”.

Whether you liked all these changes or not, it doesn’t stop 18 Til I Die from being a fantastic album. When I first bought it I was concerned about how many ballads were on it. 6 out of the 13 songs are ballads, that’s just under half! However, I can understand why BA left them on, because they are ballads of the highest quality.

The title track plus “The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You” provided two excellent singles and live songs for this album. “It Ain’t A Party…If You Can’t Come Round” and “Black Pearl” deserve a mention as two great rock songs. The first being a typical BA song whilst the second is slightly different than his usual rock songs.

“(I Wanna Be) Your Underwear” and “We’re Gonna Win” are great fun to listen to, and have to be taken for what they are - tongue-in-cheek songs. They’re not to be taken seriously because BA’s just having a laugh. In hindsight though, they certainly didn’t do much for BA’s credibility. Maybe they were a little bit too silly, which for me, just stops this album from being worthy of 5 stars.

Key Tracks:
The Only Thing That Looks Good On Me Is You
It Ain't A Party If You Can't Come Round

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