Following her imperious domination of the Electric Proms, the dame delivers her first full studio album in 20 years, singing songs written specially for her by artists such as Rufus Wainwright, Pet Shop Boys and, a blast from Bassey’s Bond-theme past, John Barry. She has recently complained about being labelled as merely a belter and, while there are moments here that justify that description, The Performance also serves as a reminder of Bassey’s genius for both phrasing — the key missing ingredient in today’s note-perfect but passionless manufactured emoting — and restraint. Tom Baxter (Almost There) and Gary Barlow (This Time) bring out the doubt beneath the bombast; the former finds Shirl imbuing a word as everyday as “foolish” with multisyllabic grandeur and bittersweet nostalgia, while Barlow’s mastery of Sondheimesque escalation is a marriage made in show-stopping heaven. The mid-album trio from Barry, Don Black, David McAlmont and David Arnold lean heavily back to the Bond days, and are the least interesting offerings here. Wainwright (Apartment) and KT Tunstall (Nice Men) home in on Bassey the skittish but regal vamp, while the Manic Street Preachers’ The Girl from Tiger Bay is a memory-lane pop beauty. Richard Hawley and PSB, with, respectively, the standouts, After the Rain and The Performance of My Life, bring the curtain down with the remorseful sigh that characterises this superb album’s finest moments.

Geffen 2720780

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