A-Ha’s farewell present

Some bands are so active, always full of inspiration and energy that they release one album after another and it takes them a year at the most to prepare the material. Perhaps their quantity is never transformed into quality but they are cool with it. The others have different periods – it is feast or famine, their music does not disappoint and they find enough time to have a rest. As for A-Ha it seems to be one of those collectives who stick to the principle ‘less is more’ in its creative work. The Norwegian team has released only 9 albums in almost three decades but there are practically no failures among them. These hits are always contemporary; they seem to exist out of time frames and that is one of the material’s high quality indicators. A-Ha’s latest album Foot Of The Mountain was released last year, at the end of which the band announced it was going to disband. This summer the musicians present us with their final compilation 25: The Very Best Of and go to their worldwide farewell tour called Ending On A High Note which will end in their native Oslo in December.

Faultless compositions and a brand new single on 25: The Very Best Of

The fact that 25: The Very Best Of is not A-Ha’s first compilation with the band’s hits supply being impressive but still exhaustible never prevents the collection from being a splendid farewell present. First, this record consisting of two parts can be listened to all the time for it is comprised of faultless compositions. Second, these compositions are placed in a chronological order, i.e. starting from the debut album presented by the Take On Me, The Blue Sky and The Sun Always Shines On TV and ending with the last creation Foot Of The Mountain. Finally the main surprise for the fan base of Morten Harket, Magne Furuholmen and Paul Waaktaar is their brand new single Butterfly, Butterfly (The Last Hurrah) closing the album. By the way, A-ha’s last video is going to be shot for it by Steve Barron, the director behind the legendary Take On Me video. The collection 25: The Very Best Of is also interesting because of some compositions presented in different versions: the 7'' remixes of Train Of Thought and Hunting High And Low, such songs as Touchy! (UK DJ Edit), Cosy Prisons (Radio Mix). On the whole these 39 tracks cover the band’s entire history that ends this year the only release to follow 25: The Very Best Of being the single Butterfly, Butterfly (The Last Hurrah), a very vivid, memorable song in with classic A-Ha impetuously measured rhythm and refined with penetrating effects, falsetto notes in the vocals and a most beautiful melody.

Passion and despair disguised in the depth of Scandinavian coldness

Some things are just to be accepted – in a year already we will use the Past tense while discussing A-Ha although its songs are definitely never going to get old. It is hard to imagine that such compositions as Take On Me, Hunting High And Low and The Sun Always Shines On TV are already 25 years old, and the songs Minor Earth Major Sky, Velvet, Summer Moved On, The Sun Never Shone That Day are only a decade old. It seems like they have always been accompanying us and for sure will always will. Hard as it is to recognize it but a time for the last album always comes. Perhaps somebody had guessed that Foot Of The Mountain was the legendary band’s swan song. Though there were some hit pretenders on that record, it lacked the passion and despair disguised in the depth of Scandinavian coldness that filled most of the earlier works. Maybe the Norwegian musicians could release some more albums if they wanted to but the decision has been taken, and we are only left to thank them for those which are already there in the collections of millions of listeners around the globe. No doubt, A-Ha will always remain the pop music icon, and the collection 25: The Very Best Of confirms it better than any words.

Alexandra Zachernovskaya
23.08.2010