Arif Mardin's production of Leo Sayer on World Radio is a bit much, and though the record has lots to offer, it gets lost in the translation. Released a year-and-a-half to two years after Living in a Fantasy, the lag time was too much space in between releases as the artist had just bounced back to serious chart action after a previous two-year Top 40 absence, and the failure of the albums Leo Sayer and Here, to generate any more than a minor hit. The Bee Gees' composition "Heart (Stop Beating in Time)" has the hooks, but Mardin doesn't drench the song in the sweetness that helped Dionne Warwick, Samantha Sang, Kenny Rogers, Dolly Parton, Frankie Valli, Barbara Streisand, Rare Earth, and others artists ride the Bee Gees' magical '70s gravy train. Clearly, Barry Gibb, Albhy Galuten, and Karl Richardson had a clue about bringing songs into the Top 40, especially their own titles. Alan Tarney's production of the Living in a Fantasy album put the artist back on track after David Courtney couldn't recapture the magic of Just a Boy. Here, Arif Mardin actually revives the failed approach of the Thunder in My Heart period, and though "Paris Dies in the Morning" and "Have You Ever Been in Love?" fare well, the potential hits that are "Rumors" and the first of four Courtney/Sayer co-writes, "Heroes," both miss the mark slightly. Also after the stripped-down three/four-piece band that made Living in a Fantasy so compact, it is back to the previous Sayer formula of utilizing the fleet of top-flight session musicians, Jeff Porcaro, Steve Luthaker, Mike Boddicker, Will Lee, Robbie Buchanan, and the rest. "Heroes" is a real heartbreaker because everything is there; the mix just doesn't do the song and performance justice. In early 1982, the squeezing of the sounds into some cardboard container just didn't bring out the best in a tune the way Sayer's rendition of Albert Hammond's "When I Need You" can still sparkle on radio decades later. That's when Richard Perry was in control of the situation. Mardin is a tremendous producer with tremendous credentials, but this album and the Looking Glass follow-up to the album with "Brandy," Subway Serenade, aren't the best Mardin had to offer. While "Have You Ever Been in Love" shimmers with good production values, "Paris Dies in the Morning" sounds like the Buggles, and the title track ends up resembling Klaatu. The sounds are well-crafted, but the wisdom of stretching to these specific musical bags was questionable. This was five years after the Carpenters wisely sweetened up "Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft" enough to get it into the Top 40, and during the time the Cars had serious album tracks like "Movin' in Stereo" and the techno rock which made up Panorama. World Radio falls somewhere between those two ideals, a hipper image for the singer/songwriter on the album cover isn't as inviting as the cool Cars mode of the Living in a Fantasy album. Sayer needed to follow up that previous disc sooner with as much enthusiasm as Ric Ocasek attacked rock radio. And the real key here was the failure to embellish the Bee Gees title, "Heart (Stop Beating in Time)" and make it a popular song. A slick cover of Bruce Cockburn's "Wondering Where the Lions Are" and the very Genesis-sounding Courtney/Sayer "The End of the Game" are substantial efforts but too far removed from the arena that brought this artist his popularity. Like Here, World Radio is a musical album and a nice addition to the Leo Sayer catalog for his hardcore fans. All it needed was some production from the Bee Gees themselves to launch it into history.