Anne Clark - Hope Road (10)

It pays to be conscientious, pop tarts. Hidden away amidst all the good, bad and just plain average records which crowd the Singles Box every fortnight, there is always one unexpected gem which stands high above the crowd. And this is it! Over a simple but effective backing track of vaguely melodic electronic "oohs" and "aahs" (sort of Laurie Anderson meets OMD), Anne Clark recites her sorry tale of how she met this nice, interesting guy at a party, was invited to dinner in a faraway town and turned up only to find, despite following instructions, that the address he gave her - Hope Road - just doesn't exist. Wail! A metaphor too, methinks, for politicians and, erm, the world around us. A few neatly cutting observations get slipped in too before Anne ends sadly with a warning to beware of unaccountably nice people because "there's no place called Hope Road". Sniff. A hit? Almost certainly not, but for making a record that dares to be different, that works on its own terms and doesn't try to sound like anybody else or as if it would sell its granny to be a hit - just this once, Anne Clark - come on down! - yours is Single Of The Fortnight. (Ian Cranna, Smash Hits, May 8, 1987)

Almost a very good little record this, as poor little Annie gets the run-around from a party acquaintance and decides to have nothing more to do with men. The sparse musical setting has a wonderfully hypnotic effect, but there are one or two outrageous bits of scanning and the odd struggle to match rhymes. In the end one has to conclude that Anne Clark gets a bit het up about not very much or all, if being given a bogus address at a party is the worst thing that happens to her, she obviously doesn't go to the parties that I do. (Andy Strickland, Record Mirror, May 9, 1987)