Beyond the undoubtedly good intentions behind the effort – which benefits The Diana, Princess of Wales Memorial Fund – there's a definite whiff of adolescent pathos stinking up the joint. When sentiment gets cranked up to this sort of quiver-lipped pitch, it's mighty hard to take it seriously

Billed as "new and special material by the world's superstar recording artists," the album was clearly rushed to release, with just over a third of the tracks exclusive to the tribute. The rest of the album is made up of songs that were "hand-picked by the artists who recorded them." Big mistake, that, since a good number of the players took the easy way out and simply picked the sappiest song they could think of.

The maudlin mood is evident from the opening strains of Queen's "Who Wants to Live Forever." It's a dolorous ditty stuffed with overwrought sentiment, with the late Freddie Mercury sob-singing, "This world has only one sweet moment set aside for us." (Unfortunately, it feels much longer, given the song's length of more than five minutes.) George Michael's "You Have Been Loved" is very nearly too corny to listen to, a calculated tear-jerker with lines like "It's a cruel world with so much to lose … take care my love, she said, you have been loved."

But there's no rest for the weary here, with miles to weep before we sleep. Annie Lennox checks in with the far from subtle lyrics of "Angel," sung about a woman "gone to meet her maker, back to where she came from." The inclusion of Eric Clapton's lachrymose "Tears in Heaven" and R.E.M.'s once heartrending "Everybody Hurts" are no big surprise; both songs could serve as blueprints for producing melancholy on demand. In that same vein – decent enough, predictable choices seemingly calculated to induce grief-lite – we find The Pretender's "Hymn to Her" and Bruce Springsteen's "Streets of Philadelphia." Yes, yes, sad songs. All right already. We get it.

Better at evoking genuine emotion is Sinead O'Connor's "Make Me A Channel of Your Peace." When the song ends with her sigh, "in dying we are born to eternal light," there's an actual moment of inspiration and calm. And Bryan Ferry's simple rendition of "Shakespeare's Sonnet No. 18" (Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?) is a swoon-worthy tribute indeed.

But those moments are few and far between. More typical of this endless bummer – which clocks in at an astounding 152 minutes – are the overwrought wailing of participants like Celine Dion and Mariah Carey. The former, who warbles the theme from "Up Close and Personal," manages to summon a pseudo-whimper in her voice ("You were my voice when I couldn't speak … you picked me up when I couldn't reach"), but it's far from convincing. And Ms. Carey's song choice? A live version of "Hero." Oh dear.

In that same vein we have Barbra Streisand ("Evergreen"), Michael Jackson ("Gone Too Soon") and Michael Bolton and Placido Domingo singing – God help us – "Ave Maria." Elton John, whose reworking of "Candle in the Wind" set sales records when it was released as a single, is conspicuous by his absence, but he's hardly missed in a field this crowded.

In the end, this package could be a generic homage to any famous dead person. Just fill in the blank, get out your hankie and let the tears gush forth.

By Julene Snyder

(This review first appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle Datebook on 12-7-97.)