Grace Jones: Private Life: The Compass Point Sessions

Grace Jones is too often dismissed as an Amazonian model-cum-musician construct, an image-based brand rather than a creative talent. To a certain extent, that description is accurate, but there's more to Jones than just fashion. While the ingenious but erratic material contained in Private Life: The Compass Point Sessions doesn't attest to her vitality, the two-disc set at least reveals her to be a keen interpreter of some choice post-punk songs. Recorded at Jones' popular and artistic peak, several of these reggae hybrids—notably The Pretenders' "Private Life," Roxy Music's "Love Is The Drug," Joy Division's "She's Lost Control," Iggy Pop's "Nightclubbing," and The Police's "Demolition Man"—made Jones an unlikely icon, albeit one who scared off many potential fans with her foreboding, eccentric persona. With the indomitable rhythm section of Sly & Robbie instilling in every song the heartbeat of Jamaican dub, the support of designer Jean-Paul Goude (Andy Warhol to her Nico), and the input of Marianne Faithfull collaborator Barry Reynolds, Jones had a reliable net should she topple from her tightrope act. The tracks included here are often presented in their entirety, and many feature companion dub mixes that fully exploit Sly & Robbie's prowess. Private Life isn't essential, but it is a curious and captivating distillation of one of pop music's oddest figures.