THE DAY AFTER YESTERDAY is an album of cover tunes that influenced Rick Springfield throughout his career.

Personnel: Rick Springfield (vocals, guitar, keyboards); Leslie-Anne Down (vocals); Dionne Gipson (spoken vocals); George Bernhardt (guitar); Eric Gorfain, Richard Dodd, Daphne Chen, Leah Katz (strings); Dino Soldo (horns); Vince DiCola, Kenny Meriedeth (keyboards); Matt Bissonette (bass guitar, background vocals); Rodger Carter (drums, loops); Ronnie Grinel (drums); Jeff Gross, Terry Santiel (percussion); Richard Page, Jamie Jones , April Lassiter, Delious Kennedy (background vocals).

Recording information: Chalice Studios, Los Angeles, California; The Doghouse, Los Angeles, California (2005).

Rather than go the usual old-chestnuts route for his covers album, Rick Springfield does something extremely rare and exceedingly clever here. Almost all of THE DAY AFTER YESTERDAY (if that sounds familiar, it's because Springfield nicked it from the film SIDEWAYS, where it was the title of the protagonist's unpublished novel) consists largely of songs that post-date Springfield's own hit-making days of the early '80s. The results are both conceptually interesting and pleasurable listening. Although the songs are of more contemporary vintage, Springfield uses the sort of mature, almost jazzy arrangement and vocal style that Rod Stewart employed on his standards albums.

Springfield may not be Tony Bennett, but the easy swing he gives to such surprisingly perfect song choices as the Church's "Under the Milky Way" and the Human League's "Human" is impressive, as is the hoarse, early Tom Waits-like delivery he chose for Gerry Rafferty's "Baker Street." By joining the past and the present, Springfield has made an intriguing pop combo (much the way Petula Clark did on her albums of the late '60s), making THE DAY AFTER YESTERDAY a wonderfully classy surprise.