Album Review: Various - Sounds Of The 80s

Even for a cover album, Sounds Of The 80s is uninspiring. With 37 tracks, you’re assured a certain quota of the listenable (London Grammar) and the inventive (Ward Thomas), but before long you’re drowning in a sea of similarity. Ed Sheeran covering Atlantic City sounds exactly like Ed Sheeran (with a chord sheet) singing Atlantic City – neither terrible nor worthwhile. Nostalgia and fidelity have their worth, but this feels too much like an album of remasters, like a computer program stripped old tracks of their vocal parts and cut-and-pasted in their nearest contemporary equivalent.