Heaven & Hell is the 13th studio album by Joe Jackson, a musical interpretation and song cycle representing the seven deadly sins. It was released in the US on 2 September 1997 and in the UK on 29 September 1997.

Billed to Joe Jackson & Friends; the friends included vocalists Dawn Upshaw ("Angel (Lust)"), Joy Askew ("Tuzla (Avarice)"), Suzanne Vega ("Angel (Lust)"), Brad Roberts from the Crash Test Dummies ("Passacaglia/A Bud and a Slice (Sloth)"), Jane Siberry ("The Bridge (Envy)"); and violinist Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg ("Prelude", "Fugue 2/Song of Daedalus (Pride)"). Both were released to target adult album alternative radio. In the early stages of the Heaven & Hell project, Jackson presented the label with some demo recordings. The label expressed interest in using the option in their contract with him to pick up a third album, but Jackson noted that "not everyone was enthusiastic" about the demos. He said in 1997, "My [belief] of the seven deadly sins is that they can all lead to either heaven or hell. We all have all seven in us and we all have heaven and hell inside us as well." To write the album, Jackson spent two years researching and reading literature on sin, a process he found "interesting" and made him "question a lot of things about what I believed". With the exception of having Suzanne Vega in mind when writing "Angel (Lust)", the musicians guesting on the album were "unplanned and grew out of the music", with Jackson comparing himself to a "casting director finding the right voices to play the characters".

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Upon its release, Julian Cole of the York Evening Press noted how, although the music is "difficult for a pop audience" and "perhaps pretentious for a classical audience", there is a "great energy and inventiveness about Jackson's compositions, mixing beautiful operatic vocals with cool adult pop".

David Patrick Stearns of USA Today summarised that Jackson had "lost none of his bite and originality", although he added that "not all the sins [produce] equally interesting" results.

Track listing

All songs written and arranged by Joe Jackson.

Personnel

; Musicians

  • Joe Jackson – piano, bongos on "Prelude", vocals on "Fugue 1/More is More", "Passacaglia/A Bud and a Slice" and "Fugue 2/Song of Daedalus", voice of Soul in Torment on "Angel", voices of Cynicism and Greed on "Tuzla"
  • Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg – solo violin on "Prelude" and on "Fugue 2/Song of Daedalus"
  • Dawn Upshaw – voice of Angel on "Angel", voice of Forgetfulness on "Tuzla"
  • Suzanne Vega – voice of Fallen Angel on "Angel"
  • Mary Rowell – violin on "Angel"
  • Allison Cornell – viola on "Angel"
  • Sue Hadjopoulos – congas and bongos on "Angel" and on "The Bridge"
  • Joy Askew – voice of Conscience on "Tuzla"
  • Brad Roberts – vocals on "Passacaglia/A Bud and a Slice"
  • Judith LeClair – bassoon on "Passacaglia/A Bud and a Slice"
  • Dan Hickey – drums (left) on "Right"
  • Kenny Aronoff – drums (right) on "Right"
  • Jared Crawford – plastic buckets on Times Square
  • Jane Siberry – vocals on "The Bridge"
  • Mary Rowell, Laura Seaton, Sandra Park, Joyce Hammann, Todd Reynolds, Mark Feldman, Naomi Katz, Cenovia Cummins, James Tsao – violins
  • Juliet Haffner, Allison Cornell, David Blinn, Katherine Beeson, Mary Rowell – violas
  • Erik Friedlander, Stephanie Cummins, Richard Locker – cellos
  • William Sloat – acoustic bass

; Production

  • Joe Jackson – arrangements, producer, art direction, photography
  • Ed Roynesdal – co-producer
  • Dan Gellert – recording engineer
  • Rich Alvy – assistant recording engineer
  • Ted Jensen – mastering engineer
  • Mary Rowell – string section coordination
  • P.R. Brown – art direction
  • Jana Leön – photography

Charts

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|+ Chart performance for Heaven & Hell

! scope="col"| Chart (1997)

! scope="col"| Peak<br>position

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References

  • Heaven & Hell album information at The Joe Jackson Archive