It’s hard to believe that it’s been 30 years since the release of Cyndi Lauper’s critically-acclaimed debut album She’s So Unusual. The album spawned some of the biggest hits of Cyndi’s career including Girls Just Want To Have Fun and Time After Atime, both of which still live on today as pop classics. To mark the 30th anniversary Cyndi has re-released the album in a variety of editions.
She’s So Unusual: A 30th Anniversary Celebration has been released as a standard edition with 3 bonus remixes, a deluxe-edition 2CD set featuring out-takes, demos and b-sides, and a beautifully packaged vinyl set. This review takes a look at the standard edition of the re-release.
For its 30th Anniversary edition the standard re-release of She’s So Unusual features the full original album remastered, brand new artwork, an essay by Jancee Dunn in the liner notes and rare photos shot by renowned photographer Annie Leibovitz. There are also three new remixes; one of Girls Just Want To Have Fun and two of Time After Time.
She’s So Unusual spawned 6 hit singles, which is pretty amazing considering there are only 10 tracks on the original album. Even if you’ve never heard the album before, it’ll sound familiar because you’ll know all of the singles. Of course Girls Just Want To Have Fun and Time After Time are the most well-known here but there are some other classics too. The hard pop and saucy lyrics of She Bop caused controversy when it was originally released as Lauper sings about masturbation, whilst the shimmering melodies of All Through The Night remind you of how Lauper’s voice can transform a song into something truly distinctive.
Elsewhere on the album opener Money Changes Everything breezes along with a message that still rings true today and the 80s beats of When You Were make you wish you were on the dancefloor forgetting your worries. Lauper has been known over her career for experimenting with reggae and ska beats and she does that twice on this record with Witness and album closer Yeah Yeah.
If you’ve already got the original album then there’s not a whole lot of reason to buy the 30th Anniversary Celebration standard edition. The three additional remixes aren’t reason enough for you to invest and we’d suggest you get yourself a copy of the deluxe 2-CD edition which boasts a lot more songs. She’s So Unusual remains a classic album but we say unless you’re a hardcore fan you’re probably not going to invest in this re-release.
