All for a Song

Background

Following the success of her 1980 album, but relative failure of her next album, Epic Records decided to take no chances with this release and included four of her past hits on the collection and backed it up with a TV advertising campaign. This resulted in All for a Song becoming the most successful album of Dickson's career. The album peaked at No.3 in the UK and spent most of the year in the charts, eventually selling over 600,000 copies in the UK alone.

Past singles included on the album were "Answer Me", "Another Suitcase in Another Hall", "Caravan Song" and "January February", while contemporary singles released from the album were "Run Like the Wind", "Take Good Care" and "I Believe in You". This was the first album to include "Caravan Song", which had been released in 1979 and was one of Dickson's most well-known songs. "Run Like the Wind" had originally been written by Mike Batt for the film Watership Down, but was replaced by "Bright Eyes".

The album cover proved to be a problem, when on doing research, the record company decided that cover photographs which featured a lot of blue didn't tend to sell well and despite the fact that the album sleeves had already been printed, they were rejected in favour of an alternative shot featuring warmer shades (see illustrations, right). The rejected covers were instead sold in Scotland and Ireland.

The album was largely recorded in the Netherlands with producer Mike Batt. Alan Tarney, the producer of her previous two albums was only used on one new track, while Dickson herself produced covers of The Beatles tracks, "The Long and Winding Road" and "With a Little Help from My Friends".

All for a Song was released twice in the Netherlands under alternate titles; first as I Believe in You and shortly after as Run Like the Wind . The latter reached No.42 in the Dutch album charts. To date, the album has never been released on Compact disc, although many of the tracks have featured on compilations.

Track listing

Side One

1. "Run Like the Wind" (Mike Batt)
2. "Caravan Song" (Mike Batt)
3. "Answer Me" (Gerhard Winkler, Fred Rauch, Carl Sigman)
4. "The Long and Winding Road" (John Lennon, Paul McCartney)
5. "Tonight" (Dickson)
6. "With A Little Help From My Friends" (Lennon, McCartney)

Side Two

1. "January February" (Alan Tarney)
2. "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" (Gerry Goffin, Carole King)
3. "Take Good Care" (Paul Bliss)
4. "I Believe in You" (Dickson)
5. "Another Suitcase in Another Hall" (Andrew Lloyd Webber, Tim Rice)
6. "Surrender to the Sun" (Mike Batt)

Personnel

Producers: