Murray
Well-Known Member
Actually Stephen, the only one who was misguided was ME it would seem! I momentarily forgot that Celine's English language debut, Unison, was released in Canada a few months after the Veronique album! In my defense, it was nearly thirty years ago! The rest of what I wrote is accurate, as I followed her career at the time, and I once had a brief conversation about the album with a former A&M Canada employee, some years after A&M closed it's Canadian office. Veronique Beliveau was an established star in Quebec in the 1980s, as was Celine. In an effort to expand her audience beyond the limited Quebec market, A&M urged Veronique to record an album in English, Borderline (her third album for A&M), in 1987. The single from that album, Make A Move On Me, charted somewhere in the 40s, and album sales, though not spectacular by any means, were high enough that A&M wanted her to make a second album in English. Management hoped that by pairing her with a well-known American producer, that her next album would be her "breakthrough" into English Canada, as well as into the US market. It just so happened that this was the year, 1989, that Richard was producing other artists, so he was approached, and agreed to work with her. What's really sad is that this "breakthrough" album sold even more poorly than it's predecessor, and ended Veronique's recording career.If A&M thought she was the next Celine Dion, they were misguided. She’s not even in the same league. Still, all that effort on her part and the album didn’t even chart? What do you have to do to garner a few sales, for heaven’s sake? Was she just not that popular a vocalist on her native soil or was it maybe the association with Richard that scuppered her chances?
The following year, 1990, Celine Dion released her English debut album, and went on to become an international superstar. After that, many French-Canadian singers made albums in English, hoping that lightening would strike twice. It didn't.
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