Crash

Crash

• Music

Nothing short of a C&W album recorded in the heart of Nashville would seem as far removed from The Human League's early experimental art-noise roots as 1986's Crash following the commercial and critical disappointment of 1984's underrated Hysteria, singers Phil Oakey, Joanne Catherall and Susanne Sulley parted with the instrumental axis of The Human League's hit making heyday and traveled to Minneapolis to record with ex-Prince protégé Terry Lewis and Jimmy Jam, then at the top of the charts as the masterminds of Janet Jackson's Control. Jam and Lewis wrote and performed the songs on Crash, with only occasional lyrical help from Oakey, and the results are fine mid-'80s pop-funk, even if they have almost nothing to do with The Human League's earlier records. The group was rewarded with the big American chart hit "Human," but from here on, every new Human League album was treated as a comeback attempt. EMI Gold. 2003.