Cliff Richard - Cliff With Strings (My Kinda Life) (LP) - Blue Vinyl

Cliff with Strings: My Kinda Life arrived on 3 November 2023 as a thoughtful, surprisingly intimate project, pairing Cliff Richard’s original vocals with newly recorded string arrangements. It reads like a love letter to a 65–year career, and it’s clear from the first swell of violins that this isn’t a novelty rerun. The songs breathe in a different way, and that shift in air changes how you hear a voice most of us know from car radios, school socials and family road trips.

The concept works best when the arrangements lean into the emotional core of each track rather than just gilding the edges. Miss You Nights was already one of his most affecting ballads, and here the strings sit close to the vocal, supporting rather than competing. It brings out the tenderness in Dave Townsend’s melody and reminds you why Cliff has called it a personal favourite over the years. On the other side of the catalogue, We Don’t Talk Anymore, the Alan Tarney era synth-pop juggernaut from 1979, gets a shimmering new lift. The pulse is still there in your head, but the violins add patient, sighing lines that underline the ache in the lyric. It makes a huge hit feel smaller in the best way, like hearing it after midnight instead of at peak hour.

Devil Woman benefits from the treatment too. The song has always had a cinematic streak, that slinky progression and coolly observed warning, and the strings go for mood rather than muscle. They slide around the vocal with just enough tension to make you think of black-and-white thrillers and late-night TV reruns. Carrie, from 1980, is another smart pick. The arrangement emphasises the uncertainty in the story, a kind of queasy hush between the phrases that suits the song’s shadowy streets. You notice how disciplined Cliff’s phrasing is on these cuts, because the strings leave space for it.

Then there’s the title track, My Kinda Life, originally a jaunty 1977 single. It bounces along with a new gloss, and while the strings obviously can’t replicate the original’s rhythm guitar chug, they find their own pocket, lifting the chorus in a way that feels more show tune than pub rock. It’s playful, and it works because the vocal is so cocksure and bright. Suddenly, the 1980 duet with Olivia Newton-John from Xanadu, lands softly and respectfully. Hearing her voice threaded into fresh orchestration after her passing in 2022 is poignant, and the new setting keeps the sweetness without tipping into syrup.

If you’re a completist for Cliff Richard albums on vinyl, this sits comfortably alongside the hits sets and the Tarney-era records. The approach is different to those big Royal Philharmonic remakes that have been fashionable lately, more focused on texture and tone than on sheer weight. That makes it an easy record to live with. You can put it on while making dinner and find yourself humming harmonies you swear weren’t there in the old versions.

Is every track a revelation? Not quite. A couple of up-tempo numbers that were born of drum machines and bright guitars can feel a touch restrained when draped in strings, and you may miss the snap of the original production. But the success rate is high, and the sequencing is deft, moving between uptempo and ballad so you never feel stuck in one gear.

As a late-career statement it’s quietly confident, almost conversational. Cliff has always been a stylist first, and the recontextualised vocals make that clear. The little details pop, the way he leans into a syllable in the pre-chorus, the clipped consonants that give the choruses their lift. These arrangements respect those choices rather than sanding them down.

For those hunting for Cliff Richard vinyl, the Cliff with Strings: My Kinda Life vinyl pressing is an easy recommendation, especially if you’re looking to buy Cliff Richard records online and want something that plays to both nostalgia and curiosity. It’s the kind of record you might spot in a Melbourne record store staff picks bin, tagged with a handwritten note that says something like “classic vocals, fresh strings, surprisingly moving.” If you’re crate digging for vinyl records Australia wide, this one earns its shelf space, a reminder that even songs you think you know inside out can show you a new colour with the right light on them.