by Jason Ankeny
You know the old cliché that so-and-so could sing the phone book and make it sound amazing? Well, the songs on Cheryl Lynn's sole Manhattan release Start Over are so bland and inept that the phone book would represent a huge upgrade by comparison--which is a shame, because the woman can sing, even if the gelatinous late-Eighties production threatens to swallow her like quicksand. Even "Don't Run Away," a reunion with "Got to Be Real" producer David Paich, entombs Lynn's natural sass and vibrancy in near-impenetrable layers of synths. Yuck.