entertainmentdissected

One of the biggest-selling female artists of all time issued another compilation this week- and it further illustrates how some of the most popular music isn’t necessarily the greatest, most acclaimed or important.

My Love: Essential Collectionrepresents the biggest hits of Celine Dion’s career. The release is available as a 17-track single disc (containing 10 top 10 hits), or a 26-track ultimate double album. The latter may be of interest to Dion’s megafans, but the single disc probably is the only audio casual listeners will need- if that.

Dion’s French-language career dates back to the 1980s, but her English-language debut came in late 1990, with the ballad “Where Does My Heart Beat Now.” The pleasant-enough track set the tone for the big-voiced diva’s U.S. career, reaching the top five on Billboard’s Hot 100 chart, but its parent album Unison didn’t enjoy the same chart success, failing to crack the top 40 on the Billboard 200. However, it eventually reached platinum status, shipping 1 million units in the USA.

Another album followed in 1992, but it wasn’t until 1994’s The Colour of My Love that the Canadian-born Dion reached superstar sales levels. The album sold more than 6 million in the USA, and spawned the No. 1 smash, “The Power of Love.” The next two albums- 1995’s Falling into You and 1997’s Let’s Talk About Love- were global sensations, each selling more than 30 million copies (10 million-plus each in the USA). 

Dion’s albums continued selling (though at levels nowhere near her peak), but what has remained consistent through her career is the lack of critical respect. What often happens with big-voiced, technically great female vocalists is that the music itself often takes a backseat to the voice- and Dion is no exception. Her latest album is titled Taking Chances- but the fact is that for the duration of her career, she’s done anything but that. 

If you’ve heard one Celine Dion album, you’ve pretty much heard them all. A formula firmly is in place, and it’s hardly varied from her first U.S. release. The latest album my boast an extra guitar or two in spots than usually are present on one of her albums, but at the core, the music is little different than the Dion’s usual fare- safe, light and digestable, but little in the way of hip, innovative or chance-taking music.

Not that Dion cares too much about being a critically acclaimed, exciting, innovative artist- she has sold more than 150 million albums worldwide and plays to sold-out crowds on a global scale. With her worldwide soundtrack smash “My Heart Will Go On,” Dion rode the cultural and global wave that was Titanic- much like how Whitney Houston’s “I Will Always Love You” helped send sales of The Bodyguard soundtrack into the stratosphere.

While pop radio may no longer give Dion much attention, her songs remain ever-present at adult contemporary radio- whether it’s “Beauty and the Beast,” “Because You Loved Me,” ”It’s All Coming Back to Me Now,”  ”That’s the Way It Is” or “A New Day Has Come,” among others, you’d be hard-pressed to turn on an AC station and not hear its most prominent act from the last two decades.

My Love stands as Dion’s first true greatest hits album in the USA; All the Way- A Decade of Song, issued in late 1999, actually wasn’t a full-fledged hits album, containing just nine hits and seven then-new recordings. Nonetheless, it’s sold more than 7 million units domestically, and thereafter came a second compilation, The Collector’s Edition, which contained random recording and few hits, and sold less than 1 million.

So, if you’ve been waiting for a comprehensive Celine Dion compilation, My Love is the closest you’ll get. It may not contain some of music history’s greatest or most important work, but it undoubtedly showcases one of its biggest and grandest voices. Whether that’s a good or bad thing, only the listener can determine.

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