Human Racing [CD]

Great to see this release being give a new lease of life. The sound is excellent and can't be faulted, and at £8.99 is a steal for the deal on offer. All the original songs and production are brilliant. No album filler just 10 strong tracks, and 4 great singles.

I do have some "anorak" points to make. Having been a fan for since the beginning and having purchased all versions of singles on vinyl, cassette and CD (bit sad I know) there are some omissions that I think would have been nice to add.

I agree with both previous reviews who have said they wanted more and some liking the album on disc one as is. I think the B sides could have been tagged on the end to make more space for some missing remixes.

Namely:

The Wouldn't It Be Good Simon Boswell mix which was on the B Side on the 2nd Human Racing 12".

The Hi Energy 12" of Dancing Girls by Alan Coulthard (also known as the Special New Mix). This was a second 12" and the B side had a Simon Boswell remix of Drum Talk too. Both sadly missing.

It would have been nice to have the 7" version of Dancing Girls as well. The 7" had a slightly different intro and the end had some brass overlays on it.

It would have been also great to see the original rare 12" of I Won't Let The Sun Go Down On Me which came out in 1983 and wasn't a major hit. When re released after Dancing Girls the 12" changed to the mix on the CD by Simon Boswell.

This leads to another point, Nik's sleeve notes say that some of the mixes were by Simon Darlow and that he can't remember some others. The ones he listed as Simon Darlow were actually listed on the original vinyls as Simon Boswell, so not sure where the Darlow name comes from.

He says he can't remember who did the remix for Human Racing or Bogart. The former on the 12" says Simon Boswell and listening to Bogart for the first time it sounds in Boswell's style. Similar to his remix of Faces.

Though I know it sounds like complaining, but if they were getting the original tapes out it would have been great to get them all out and give us some real rarities for us completists. All of this could have been fitted onto the 55 minutes of spare space on the 2 discs. (yes, sad - I checked)

I do hope they do a similar job of The Riddle, though I know there are less rare mixes available for this album (or are there, we didn't know about Bogart!).

Please Universal do us proud. I expect the same treatment for Radio Musicola and The Works is pushing it too far, but we can but ask as they are great albums (and mixes) too.

Buy It Now - you won't regret it.

Ah...what it was to be 13 years old, without a care in the world and living through an era when pop music was colourful, flamboyant and full of character (unlike the plastic autotuned talentless pretty boys and bimbos of today). Two debut albums of 1984, both with similar titles, hit my radar and have pretty much stuck there ever since, mainly because of their superb songwriting but also because they're quite simply brilliant albums. Howard Jones Human's Lib was the first and Nik Kershaw's Human Racing was the other. I have to admit to being a huge fan of both this and follow up, The Riddle, before my teenage interest wandered off to pastures new. I bought the singles, the remixes, the albums (like you did back then). I've found it quite remarkable and an incredible oversight that Human Racing has never been revisited before and has, for a number of years, been totally out of print. So when I discovered that Universal were to finally dust off the masters and reissue it on their new 'Re-presents' imprint I was pleasantly surprised. My faith in catalogue departments has taken a battering recently with lack lustre reissues and over-priced, underwhelming 'super-deluxe' editions so it's nice to know that the biggest player of them all, Universal, has finally decided they have gold that is worth mining.
The album itself is a product of it's time. No doubt about it but listening to it again it's astounding just how good it still is. Superbly dynamic and brilliantly arranged with an emphasis on melody and hooks. Catchy choruses a-plenty, guitar solos and the customary 80s keyboards and brass section. The four singles released were radio friendly slices of pop/rock that touched on thought provoking lyrics backed up by memorable tunes.
Included here are the remixes that graced the obligatory 12" format of the day (RIP real format), many available on CD for the first time. Typical of their time, they rejigged the tracks, looped various aspects of it and gave it a punchy back beat. Some of them went on a bit, got a little annoying and probably drove you nuts but listening to them today makes me realise just how superior the sound was to the saturated, compressed and ear-fatiguing trash of today.
Amusing notes from the man himself who, almost 30 years later, is able to recall his memories as an emerging artist in a business that has now changed beyond recognition (and not for the better).
Finally, the remastering is quite simply brilliant. Sadly, nobody is credited in the liner notes but whoever did the job should be proud of their effort. Amazing clarity and detail, superbly balanced with incredible dynamics. Sounds very faithful to the original vinyl. No ridiculous compression and artificial boosting of levels here. Turn it up and be moved by the sound. Exactly how a good remaster should sound.
At £9 this is a brilliant value reissue in every way and hopefully Universal will see fit to at least do the same with The Riddle which is as equally deserving.
Also, let's hope the 'Re-presents' imprint brings us many more forgotten gems that deserve another spin in these dying days of physical media.

I'm not claiming to be as big a Kershaw fan as some of the other reviewers on here, but I do have a soft spot for Human Racing. It was one of the first CDs I bought when I got my Ferguson player in 1985. There weren't a huge number of titles available so I took a chance on Nik's debut.

27 years later, I was pleased to see this upgrade and took advantage of the low price. I have to say that the remastering is first rate. Too many times nowadays, our ears are assaulted by overly compressed reissues that have you running back to the originals. Human Racing sounds lovely and it's nice to be reminded what an excellent singer and songwriter Kershaw is.

I'm not a massive remix fan so Disc 2 was largely redundant to me. There are a few new (to me) songs that I presume are the B-sides to HR's vinyl singles and these are decent enough to warrant repeated plays. There's also witty sleevenotes from Mr Kershaw himself, which makes it a splendid package, all in all.

So, Human Racing 2012 is absolutely worth your time, and like other reviewers here, I hope something similar for The Riddle is planned.