Take Me High was the soundtrack to another in the growing parade of blink-and-you'll-miss-it musical movies that
Cliff Richard had been making since the mid-'60s, although its timing could scarcely have been better. Early 1973 saw him score his biggest U.K. hit in five years, when "Power to All Our Friends" rose to number four. Unfortunately, it wasn't a part of the album, and so the opportunity to capitalize on the smash passed by, and his next 45, the movie's own title track, fizzled at a lowly number 29. Neither did it deserve much better. Little about the album appealed, from its tawdry cover art on to the soulless succession of lightweight Tony Cole ballads that were the heart of the soundtrack. Indeed,
Richard himself apparently acknowledged this by piling a couple of instrumentals into the fray for the first time since his days with
the Shadows. The difference was, of course, was that the anonymous sidemen who backed him up were not
the Shadows. It should also be noted that former Doctor Who girl Debbie Watling,
Richard's co-star and occasional singing partner, was a great actress, but she was no Una Stubbs in the vocal department. Released as Hot Property in the U.S., Take Me High was a failure at the box office and didn't do much better in the record stores.
Cliff Richard's darkest hour was not over yet. ~ Dave Thompson