Olivia Newton-John Physical Revisited

https://www.popmatters.com/olivia-newton-john-physical-2613720727.amp.html

 

Although I prefer Olivia's country/folk material to her "pop" era, Physical is my favourite album of hers. It's one of those albums that has some fantastically catchy singles and some even greater album tracks. Carried Away, in particular, is unspeakably beautiful.

 

I like this album as well and I had quite the crush on this very beautiful and talented singer back in the day. I got to see Olivia on her Physical Tour in 1982 at the Irvine Meadows Amphitheater In Southern California. She was fantastic and had one of the greatest studio live pop bands ever assembled with the great Tom Scott, Michale Landau and Carlos Vega at the core of her band. They filmed the show for HBO in Ogden, Utah and I must have watched that show a few dozen times over the years.

 

Never cared for country ONJ but once Totally Hot came out I became a big fan.

Physical was a very good album.

Also a big fan of Soul Kiss.

I also saw her in concert in 82.

 

Wow, great article.

 

That’s not only a fantastic article, it’s undeniably the best one I’ve ever read about any of Olivia’s albums. It makes you want to listen to the album again because you might have missed something. Thanks for finding and posting this.

 

Although Totally Hot remains my favourite Olivia album, Physical is probably her best overall pop one. I admit I never thought the title track was one of her best songs, but it was an obvious attention-getter and hit. The Physical project all came together perfectly. The singles and album supported by the videos, TV special and later tour. It was also a ‘fresh’ look and sound for Olivia after the 1980 Xanadu movie and soundtrack.

It would be 4 years until Olivia’s next studio album. Soul Kiss was the opposite to Physical in every way. It’s a decent pop LP, but unlike Physical, nothing came together at all. The lead single was disappointing and peaked at #20. The 5 videos filmed were half-hearted and Olivia did little promotion for the record as she was heavily pregnant by the time it was released in October 1985. Talk about a contrast.

If I had to pick my 2 favourite Olivia albums, they would be 1975’s Have You Never Been Mellow from her country/folk/pop era and the aforementioned Totally Hot from her pop/rock one. These to me were the best she ever got. Still, Physical despite ‘only’ reaching #6 (aside from the Grease and Xanadu soundtracks she’d also had 2 #1 solo albums) is probably the biggest album of her career and the one people are most likely to remember. Great album. Great video album. Amazing artwork. Just a shame she never came close to this ever again.

 

Spot on. As a body of work - from the artwork to the songs to the videos - it is unrivaled in Olivia's catalogue. A great example of all the stars aligning, and of course capturing a pop cultural zeitgeist moment in the process.

The PopMatters article is superb. It's wonderful to hear the creative contributors speak in such detail about the making of the album. It's great to read John Farrar be given his dues by his peers - no wonder he and Olivia got on so well because, just like Olivia, no one who has ever worked with John has a bad word to say about him. He comes across as hard-working, incredibly humble, and great company. I especially like that this article makes a point of singling out the innovative guitar sounds he achieved on 'Physical'. They have a glistening quality that stood out from the other pop records of the time and still sound unique to Farrar's production. It gives the album a lightness that is still delightful to hear, which teamed with the more aggressive songwriting and Olivia's very inviting vocals made for a curious alchemy of contrasts that somehow work in perfect harmony with each other.

It's gratifying to see this level of attention lavished on the 'Physical' album, with as much space given to songs like 'Recovery' and 'Stranger's Touch' as its title track mega-hit. Some of Olivia's 1970s albums felt like a collection of songs thrown together, but 'Physical' has a sense of intention from start to finish. Even the 'filler' songs like 'Love Make Me Strong' earn their rightful place on the album and all 10 of the songs are essential for one reason or another.


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Well I know that I have the vinyl of this album on the shelf in the basement, but I haven't played it in years. My favorite memory of this album is that John Farrar recorded his own excellent version of the song "Falling", which I truly enjoyed far more than Olivia's take on it.



I find that the CD comp called "Magic" is pure Olivia and about all that I really need, outside of the two-part DVD set that I have of her videos, whenever I need to "see" her.

Olivia Newton-John - Magic: The Very Best Of Olivia Newton-John

 

It was somehow fitting that Olivia was nowhere in sight on this mammoth reappraisal of Physical too.

 

We know she's not one to look back on her music. I still laugh every time I think about a friend meeting her during the Vegas residency at the Flamingo and asking her to sign the 12" of 'Livin' In Desperate Times', and Olivia saying with all sincerity 'I don't remember this one...'


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And didn’t she forget I Need Love, and someone from the audience had to sing a bit of it to refresh her memory?

Mind you, I can’t blame her for forgetting I Need Love..

 

Really great article! And I agree Physical is Olivia's most polished/complete era, as well the most aesthetically cohesive - and the album is just great as well, one of my favorites. A fourth single would be really welcomed, though.

For such a popular and innovative project at the time it came out, it's sad to see that people nowadays barely know about its impact and quality. Olivia's legacy is so underrated, even among pop music fans.

Good to see another fan of this great and misunderstood album. I actually think Soul Kiss is as good, if not better, than Physical. It's not only an unique mark on Olivia's discography, but also an unusually complex album for an 80s female pop singer. The album photoshoot is actually my favorite from her, and the whole era could be her best one if Olivia had released the video album like it was originally intended and also done a thematic tour.

 

Soul Kiss is a good album, but the timing was horrible. Everything that worked in Physical’s favour did the opposite for SK. I still believe it’s main problem was the lack of a killer single. Physical was undoubtedly sold by the title track. Whether you like the song or not.. Soul Kiss (the song) was a different sound for Olivia, but ultimately not strong enough to take her back to the top 10. Especially considering the quality of the charts around this time.

I’ve said this before, but I think they’d have been better leading with something like Culture Shock. It’s not an amazing song, but it reprises the sound of the Physical album better than SK and may have connected more with the public. It also may have gotten more attention for its ‘saucy’ lyric, though this, of course, may have been the reason it wasn’t picked as a single....

 

I forgot to say that Olivia has posted a link to this article on Twitter page, so even she must have enjoyed it.

 

I agree. I love the album, but it doesn't have a track that stands out like an obvious single, like Physical and 80s Madonna albums, who have more than one.

I think the title track could have worked if it was preceded by a big hit. Olivia said to Billboard that she and Farrar wanted Toughen Up as the lead single, but MCA opted for Soul Kiss; even if it went their way, I still don't think it would be enough. Cultural Shock was another option, but it would be a risky move, and could easily have backfired on her.

 

There was no A Little More Love, Magic or Physical on Soul Kiss unfortunately.

 

Great write up except for the error in mentioning Soul Kiss as the last MCA album. I guess ”The Rumour” never spread to Wilkaine that there was one more album in 1988.

Lot of great details and nice to see the universally loved deep cuts by fans like Falling , Recovery, and Strangers Touch get their props. I do wish Livvy had done more to talk about her albums in her memoir but at least Farrar, Holzman, and Snow have been forthcoming. Speaking of the latter, I reached out to Tom a few years back to let him know about the new mixes of Getting Ready For Love & Top Of The World on the Diana Ross “Baby it’s Me” expanded edition and he was so gracious. He did note though that Universal never reached out to him to talk about the songs and he would’ve been glad to.

I hate to be the Soul Kiss album dissenter here but I sometimes wonder if a lot of us ONJ fans only really like it due to a lack of alternative pop albums from her. Almost all of the tracks when placed next to the Physical ones don’t stack up or exceed them. In a way SK is her final pop/rock album. The Rumour has a few pop oriented tracks but it’s all over the place with tracks about divorce, men staying home while the wife works, and the aids threat. Outside of things like a couple of the Back To Basics cuts, we’ve gotten mostly lullabies, covers, a country set, and a lot of healing music ever since. I still cling to the dream that Livvy will make us an adult pop record again with John and the writers from her 78-85 purple patch but if I never get it that’s ok because of the legacy her 71-92 albums have left us with.

 

"Physical" reminds me way too much of my "5th High School Reunion"

Kinda like "Oh, so you're divorced already?" That's a shame.....

(circa 1981)

 

Yes she did! She worked out the melody after he started singing and tried to sing along, but the words escaped her.


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What? She doesn't remember one of my favorite songs? Omg

 

What a great article, Carried Away is still one of my favorite Olivia tracks.