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Late last year, Cherry Red continued its series of reissues from Hi-NRG queen Hazell Dean with a trip back to the Essex-born singer’s earliest days.  The Decca Years, from the Strike Force Entertainment imprint, rounds up a dozen single sides originally released on the Decca label between 1975 and 1978, while a quartet of bonus tracks round up four ‘80s rarities.

While Dean’s career took off with such dance-pop hits as “Searchin’ (I Gotta Find a Man),” “Whatever I Do (Wherever I Go),” and “Who’s Leaving Who,” she admits in a new introduction to The Decca Years that “I had always wanted to record big ballads, fabulous songs with beautiful lyrics and sweeping string arrangements, but my fate was to take me in a very different direction…”  Now, those pop-soul offerings can finally be enjoyed anew.

After kicking off with Dean’s debut single, a proto-disco revival of Mort Garson and Bob Hilliard’s oft-recorded “Our Day Will Come,” the collection moves into original territory with songs primarily written and produced in plush style by Paul Curtis, with whom she had worked in the band Union Express.  Their ballad “I Couldn’t Live Without You for a Day” was the 1976 entry in the Song for Europe competition.  (Curtis holds the record as the songwriter with the most songs to make the finals of this contest in which the annual Eurovision song entry for the U.K. is selected – 20 songs between 1975 and 1992.)

All twelve of Hazell’s Decca single sides are included on this compilation including the Jackson 5-meets-Kiki Dee-esque “You Promised Me the Love,” northern soul favorite “Got You Where I Want You,” big ballad “You Were There,” catchy, uptempo “Look What I Found at the End of the Rainbow,” and wistful “Where Are We Going?”  Dean then teamed with producer-arranger Del Newman for her final four Decca singles which continued in the richly melodic vein of Curtis’ productions.  Newman arranged songs by Madeline Sunshine and Frank Coppola (“No One’s Ever Gonna Love You,” also recorded by American country singer Janie Fricke on her 1978 Columbia debut), Hazell herself (“Just One More Time,” co-written with Sarah Beth Terry and Ira Dean, composed with a pleasing Bacharach-esque cadence), prolific tunesmith Gloria Sklerov and Phyllis Molinary (“Who Was That Lady”), and, once again, Paul Curtis (another lightly disco-flavored offering, “One Bad Mistake”).

Though the four non-Decca bonus tracks are sonically far-removed from the core material, they’re nonetheless rare treats for longtime Dean fans. These include the first CD release of “You Got Me Wrong” and “O, That’s Nice,” a 1981 single credited to Curtis and Dean, a.k.a. Paul and Hazell; and her 1984 Song for Europe entry “Stay in My Life” along with its B-side, “Too Young for Your Love.”

The Decca Years is housed in a digipak and includes a 20-page booklet with the artist’s introduction, liner notes by SFE’s Barney Ashton-Bullock, track annotations, and copious picture sleeve images.  Oli Hemingway has mastered the audio.  The CD is available now at the links below.  As an Amazon affiliate, we earn from qualifying purchases.

Hazell Dean, The Decca Years (Cherry Red/Strike Force Entertainment SFE116, 2025) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

1. Our Day Will Come
2. I Couldn’t Live Without You for a Day
3. You Promised Me the Love
4. Got You Where I Want You
5. You Were There
6. Look What I Found at the End of the Rainbow
7. Where Are We Going?
8. No One’s Ever Gonna Love You (The Way That I Love You)
9. Just One More Time
10. Who Was That Lady (I Saw You With)
11. One Bad Mistake
12. Our Day Will Come (Instrumental) – The Hazell Dean Orchestra
13. You Got Me Wrong – Curtis & Dean
14. O, That’s Nice – Curtis & Dean
15. Stay in My Life
16. Too Young for Your Love

Tracks 1 & 12 from Decca single F13613, 1975
Tracks 2-3 from Decca single F13622, 1976
Tracks 4-5 from Decca single F13688, 1976
Tracks 6-7 from Decca single F13683, 1977
Tracks 8-9 from Decca single F13736, 1977
Tracks 10-11 from Decca single F13751, 1978
Tracks 13-14 from Dureco Benelux single 4420, 1981
Tracks 15-16 from Proto Records single (cancelled) ENA 116, 1984