leaves her voice, lending it emotional clout beyond its technical limitations." Jaime Gill from Yahoo! Music UK called the album "a rather lovely record and quite possibly the last Spice-related release which anyone in the world barring immediate family members even vaguely cares about - she chose wisely. Like its charming predecessor Free Me, Life in Mono comes wrapped-up in a vogueish '60s French pop gleam, all sugary harmonies, luscious strings and crafty Bacharach style arrangements. MSN remarked that "while unlikely to be a chart topper, nevertheless Life In Mono is a charming record and reason enough for Emma to delay that pension-boosting Spice Girls reunion any time soon." Digital Spys Miriam Zendle opined that "there are a whole number of problems with this album, though Emma Bunton's voice is not one of them. It's utterly bland and very repetitive in terms of content. It seems to be geared very much towards the Christmas market and as such is incredibly cheesy and soft-focus. It's hard to find any tracks that really stand out, as they pretty much all sound exactly the same. Bunton's gentle, lovely vocals are the only thing that keeps the album from sinking into forgettability, but at the end of the day, it's just not enough." AllMusic editor Sharon Mawer called it "a safe album, light and fluffy with almost no substance". Talia Kraines from BBC Music felt that "there's little on this album that could see Emma bothering [another top 5 hit]. That's not to say little ol' Baby Spice hasn't tried [...] but while she may be continuing the Sixties vibe of Free Me, there's nothing that even flirts with the beehive razzamatazz of "Maybe"." Chart performance The album was Bunton's first not to reach the UK top 10. Life in Mono debuted on the UK Albums Chart at number 65 on 10 December 2006 and fell to number 75 in its second week before dropping out of the chart the following week. Track listing Charts References 2006 albums Emma Bunton albums Universal Music Group albums