He's become a bit of a joke in recent years, old Mick Hucknall: rich, bloated media fodder, churning out an obligatory album every few years. Well, that's what we've been led to believe anyway, but it's not entirely true.
The late '80s and early '90s peak of A New Flame and Stars has never been matched, but amidst the lazy covers, re-releases and saccharine nonsense that made up his output over the past fifteen years, there has been the occasional glimpse of his talent. 2003's Home suggested he had some fire left after all: released on his own label, the likes of Sunrise and the title track were a return to the sophisticated soul sound of old; the perfect backdrop for that magnificent voice. And now, after a money-spinning acoustic re-recording of old classics on 2005's Simplified, he seems to have pulled his socks up and decided to carry on where he left off.
So Not Over You may be defiantly middle-of-the-road, but it's the sound of Mick Hucknall doing what he does best, and doing it rather well indeed. As with much of his back-catalogue, the voice (still probably the best male soul voice in the country) manages to turn an OK song into something memorable.
You can't blame a multi-millionaire megastar for getting complacent every now and again, but while he continues to come up with genuine quality like this, he'll continue to have something left to offer.
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