Though Take That had disbanded, like George Michael and Wham! ten years earlier, such was the standing of the band that it comes as no surprise that the fans crossed over to Gary Barlow's solo career in sufficient numbers to make his debut solo single number one. Like Michael's 'A Different Corner' too, 'Forever Love' is suggestive of a man keen to draw a line between 'then' and 'now'; in both songs the good time partythons of old are jettisoned in favour of a sparse introspection that aspires to maturity. Unlike Michael though, Barlow's voice was always co-star material only - fine in an ensemble but too flat and hollow to carry a song all by itself and by illustration he drifts through his own song here in a somnambulistic trance, pondering the mysteries of love with all the passion of a man on holiday wondering if he turned the gas off.That's not entirely Barlow's fault though, a far superior vocalist like Michael wouldn't have been able to make a much better fist of it either; the raw material is lacking. 'Forever Love' is a Barlow original, but it sounds like a cover version composite of all the piano led love ballads he probably heard on the radio growing up, making it a patchwork of clichéd motifs that strive to complete an 'I can do that' box ticking exercise rather than aspiring to any genuine purpose - I've read the lyrics through three times now and I'm still not clear if he's in love and happy or out of it and sad ("In a minute I'm needing to hold her, in an hour I'm cold, cold as stone. When she leaves it gets harder and harder to face life alone". Perhaps more tellingly, I've also tried to listen to the song three times this evening and, while it's all inoffensive enough, it's also unmemorable and unengaging to the extent that each time, after about two minutes, I've found my mind wandering to something else (possibly to whether I've left the gas on or not). And in the final analysis, that's 'Forever Love's' main problem; it's just too dull to deserve your full attention.
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