1995 Robson & Jerome: I Believe

Another outing for the singing soldiers (surnames only this time) with another reliable workhorse of a song on day release from the retirement home. In terms of popularity, Frankie Laine's eighteen week at the top 1953 version has to be the benchmark, but Messer's Robson and Jerome abandon Laine's intensity for a lighter touch on their friendlier trinket of a version that's as faithful as it's predictable. With neither voice capable of raising any rafters, the music is left to shoulder the work of building to an end of the pier crescendo of massed choirs, kettle drums and tubular bells (well, it is Christmas) that's akin to drilling holes into a Ford Fiesta exhaust just to make it sound more powerful. Frankie didn't need any of that nonsense, but then again he had a vocal presence that could fill a room with no help whatsoever. Neither Robson nor Jerome, together or singularly, could say as much and this version is polite, harmless and totally unnecessary. Unless it has a subliminal backward 'Jointhearmyjointhearmyjointhearmy' message in there somewhere. Which I doubt. So 'totally unnecessary' it is then.