Anastacia - the Biggest Voice in Pop - is back – with a brand new single and album. “Our Songs”. The album celebrates the music Anastacia fell in love with while in Germany and presents 12 English-language interpretations of German top hits from 1980-2020 – including the brand-new single ‘Now Or Never’. Anastacia will be performing the single in BBC Radio 2’s Piano Room on 5th February.
Anastacia first broke through in Europe with the hands in the air smash ‘I’m Outta Love’ and has continued to have global success.
Following 2022’s sold-out “I’m Outta Lockdown” UK/EU tour, award-winning singer songwriter and global superstar Anastacia recorded “Our Songs,” released through Stars by Edel. The idea was the culmination of several visits to Germany with Anastacia deciding to record a series of some of the country’s most cherished songs, throughout the years, in English. The result has brought together some of the biggest anthems into a body of work ready for an international audience for the first time, with the focus date being 23rd February.
The first UK release from “Our Songs” is ‘Now Or Never’, previously a massive hit for German artist Johannes Oerding originally released in 2019 (titled “An guten Tagen”). On ‘Now or Never’, Anastacia uses that massive “wind beneath my wings” to lift the song’s arrangement and raise the bar once again. You can watch the official music video for ‘Now Or Never’ here!
Speaking about the single, Anastacia says: “‘Now or Never’ is very special song to me as it’s about making the best out of every day and living your life to its fullest which is exactly how I live my life.”
The album opens with track ‘Best Days’, an inspirational and soaring anthem originally released by the one and only Die Toten Hosen in 2012 (entitled “Tage wie diese”). You can watch the video here. Anastacia’s stunning version of this iconic #1 German track puts her own spin on it in the most mind-blowing way. “I’ve been waiting for this day to come, hope stayed alive inside me all along,” she sings (with the translation exclusively assisted by Toten Hosen lead singer Campino). With an epic guitar intro, ‘Best Days’ is a timeless pop/rock anthem that sparks new strength and confidence in dark moments and feels “like a siren, a secret song”, celebrating being alive in this very moment.
‘Beautiful’, a heartfelt song about encouragement, unconditional (maternal) love, is an epic rendition of Sarah Connor’s “Wie schön du bist,” originally dedicated to her son (and released in 2015). Anastacia’s unconditional love for her family and fans gave this song a very personal touch.
For ‘Born To Live’, Anastacia turns Unheilig’s epic 2010 smash ‘Geboren um zu leben’ into a spine-tingling track. A #2 success in Germany upon its release, and one of the top 10 biggest tunes of 2010, the original composition is a stunning ode to life, addressing the incredible value of being alive: “Those memories, too many from the past.” An emotional song, expressing the rawness of moving on. Anastacia’s rendition of this song is exceptionally powerful.
“I might be more than just a fan for you“– a fitting line from ‘Cello’ (Udo Lindenberg), a tune that sounds “so sweet and mellow”. For ‘Just You’, a stunning interpretation of Peter Maffay’s ‘So bist du’, Anastacia was joined by the German singer in the studio for a brand-new duet version.
Anastacia’s heartfelt take on Silbermond’s ‘Symphony’, a melancholy farewell set to music, is even more touching than the original composition.
Before returning to Alphaville’s existentialist question “Do you really want to live forever?”, Anastacia lifts her wings for Reamonn’s gold-certified debut single from 2000: “I’m a supergirl and supergirls just fly,” Anastacia uses her vocal superpowers to make this huge chorus fly even higher. The quiet guitar arrangement leaves plenty of room for that voice, making “Supergirl” another XL anthem that sounds both completely new yet strangely familiar. The album ends with The Kelly Family’s ‘An Angel’, a #2 hit (in Germany; #1 in Austria) that was everywhere in 1994: “Sometimes I wish I were an angel/Sometimes I wish I were you” – another one of those lines that rarely sounded as stunning and intense as here.
Ranging from powerful pop hits to stadium-sized rock radio anthems originally written and recorded in German, the US singer has reimagined the most uplifting, inspirational, and moving songs from various genres of Germany’s biggest hits from the last few decades. “I like to do firsties,” she recently commented, when asked about “Our Songs”, a project “that’s never been done.”