All Around The World

JASON DONOVAN: "All Around The World" (Polydor)

THE CATHOLIC Church's position on Jason Donovan is unambiguously straightforward. It is not a sin to be Jason Donovan. It is only a sin to engage in the recording of Jason Donovan albums.

All Around The World makes it very easy to love the sinner but hate the sin. The collection is supposed to chart some musical journey or other which Jason feels he has recently undertaken. On the sleeve notes, he even bangs on about this "journey" as if he were a latterday Brian Eno. "Working on this record was like basically building a whole new world," he proclaims, "discovering also that music has no boundaries, nobody really knows what is right or what is wrong." Well, nobody involved in this album anyway.

At best, it's a roll of holiday snaps, overexposed and not yet developed. A bit like Jace himself, really. We get a couple of popsqueaks from his days on the SAWmill ('Rhythm of the Rain', 'Too Many Broken Hearts'), his party pieces from his time in Joseph And His Amazing Technicolour Yawn ('Any Dream Will Do', 'Close Every Door') and a few of his karaoke cabaret classics ('Once In My Life', 'As Time Goes By'). For those of you who missed any of these the first time 'round, this is a golden opportunity for you to miss them again.

There's some new material included here too (Jason even makes his co-writing debut on the appropriately-titled 'Falling') but it's only new in the sense that more old rope can be said to be new. At least, Kylie Minogue had the good sense to use her fame as an excuse to re-invent herself. Jason only uses his to re-invent the wheel.

Jason Donovan should really go out more.

• Liam Fay