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Seal's 'Human Beings' a blend of old and new By Michael Epstein I am the Lizard Queen! ATLANTA November 20, 1998
 British singer-songwriter Seal burst on the music scene in 1991
with his debut solo release, Crazy. While he quickly became popular in dance clubs in England and the rest of Europe, his popularity in the U.S. was not as big, and did not grow significantly after the release of his second self-titled release in 1994. Major U.S. success came for Seal when director Joel Schumacher, a Seal fan, chose to use "Kiss From A Rose", on the Batman Forever soundtrack. From then on Seal's career skyrocketed.
His album quickly topped the charts, and in 1996 he took home the Grammys for Record of the Year, Song of the Year and Best Pop Vocal Performance. He then ended that phenomenal year with a cover of Steve Miller's "Fly Like an Eagle," for the Space Jam soundtrack.
Essentially, this is Seal's first new album in four years. Four years is a long time, and one would think that would be more than enough time to build upon the great the sound he already had. However, Human Being falls short of expectations. Human Being sounds like Seal, only it lacks the "oomph" of Seal. Human Being has an electronic flavor to it. This is no surprise as William Orbit, the man behind Madonna's electronic venture "Ray of Light," also worked on Human Being.
Human Being is much more soulful and soothing than Seal's previous work. Like his previous albums, Seal mixes his unique, rich vocals with cutting edge sounds. However these songs will probably sound better as dance mixes.
Human Being does have several good songs on it, but the ironic thing is that the better the song is, the more it sounds like the old Seal.
Probably the best song on the album, "Lost My Faith," suspiciously resembles the hit song, "Don't Cry." Don't worry though, there are good songs on the album that don't necessarily sound like older Seal songs. Surprisingly, these songs all happen to be on the second half of the album.
Track 8, "When a Man is Wrong," is a soulful ballad that is a delight to the ears. Track 11, "No Easy Way," is also a smooth tune worth checking out. The title track of the album is also worth a listen. While these several songs are redeeming, the other songs have little to offer. In fact some of them, such as "Princess," a lullaby of sorts, features cheesy lyrics and is all around annoying.
As an album, Human Beings is fairly solid with quite a bit going for it considering Seal's past efforts. As an album that one would buy, this just does not cut it. As far as I can see the reasons why one should even consider purchasing this album are if they are a huge Seal fan, a big pop music buff or an aficionado of mellow music.
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Copyright © 1998 by Gregory S. Scherrer, Editor and by the Student Publications Board
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