Success continued to elude Chris Rea on his third album, Tennis, on which he began to experiment with slightly longer songs and more free-form jamming, the songs "Every Time I See You Smile," "Stick It," and the title track all being over five minutes long. For Tennis, he enlisted the assistance of Raphael Ravenscroft on saxophone fresh from his crowning moment on the Gerry Rafferty "Baker Street" single and Pete Wingfield on keyboards, among many other musicians to contribute to this album, but Chris Rea himself stamped his personal mark on the album, writing all the songs, providing vocals, guitar, and keyboards, and he even dispensed with the need for an outside producer.

Dancing with Strangers is the ninth studio album by British singer-songwriter Chris Rea, released in 1987. It became Rea's first major success in UK, peaking at #2, behind Michael Jackson's Bad, and spent 46 weeks in the charts, achieving Platinum accreditation. It reached the Top 10 in six other European countries, while in New Zealand it became a number one album. "Let's Dance" was released as the first single and, like the album, became a major hit for Rea in UK, peaking at #12. In tone with the success of the album, "Let's Dance" became a major hit in New Zealand as well, peaking at #2. The other singles released from this album were "Loving You Again" (UK #47), "Joys of Christmas" (UK #67) and "Que Sera" (UK #73).

UK compilation album that brings together a collection of Chris Rea's early work between 1978 to 1984. The set provides a comprehensive look at Rea's progression as a solo artist, which started following spells in bands Magdalene and The Beautiful Losers. With a career spanning over 40 years and over 30 million album sales, Chris Rea's distinctive husky-gravel vocal and incredible body of work has seen him become one of the most loved solo artists the UK have ever produced. A formidable songwriter, and still playing live to this day, he has released an incredible 24 studio albums, the most recent being 'Road Songs for Lovers' in 2017 which was met with huge critical and commercial acclaim.

A sequel of sorts to his earlier On the Beach, King of the Beach continues the laid-back mood of the earlier album but is (despite the goofy title) a more mature and unified work. It's one of his best albums and is a return to form after the film soundtrack La Passione and the more electronic sounds of The Road to Hell Part 2. Written primarily during a vacation in the Turks and Caicos Islands, it's replete with lots of beach and summer imagery in the titles ("King of the Beach," "All Summer Long," "Sandwriting," "Sail Away") as well as the lyrics, which were originally written as poems. A remix of "All Summer Long" was a big dance hit in Ibiza and other Mediterranean hot spots. A good album for a summer day, with a soulful mellowness flowing through the tracks.

Chris Rea remained one of the best-kept secrets in the music industry, releasing five albums between 1979 and 1983, none of them reaching even the Top 50 in the charts. All were very well received by both the critics and the public who knew the secret. His secret was a brand of late-night rock that had an element of class, not dissimilar at this stage of his career to the early-'80s Dire Straits albums, but totally out of step, and proudly so, with the music of the time – new romantic, power and synth pop. He opened the album Water Sign with the song "Nothing's Happening by the Sea," which was so far laid back it was almost horizontal, with a harmonica instrumental break, and the album closed with a nod to synth pop on the track "Out of the Darkness." "Love's Strange Ways" was a similarly slow-moving Dire Straits-style number with an acoustic guitar picking out some notes throughout the song. "Let It Loose" had a driving rock beat, as did "I Can Hear Your Heartbeat," the only single taken from Water Sign.

ERA 1 (As, Bs and Rarities 1978-1984) is a new Chris Rea rarities compilation that brings together his early work in a triple-CD package.

The perfect album for a day at the beach, Rea's eighth album takes the listener from the water's edge of the title song to the sunny fields of the French countryside in "Giverny." The upbeat reggae feel of "Lucky Day" works particularly well, but it is "On the Beach" that's the standout track…

Five CD box set containing a quintet of original albums from this British singer/songwriter: Espresso Logic, On The Beach, Road To Hell, Shamrock Diaries and Watersign

British singer and guitarist Chris Rea has enjoyed a run of popularity in Europe during the late '80s and early '90s after almost a decade of previous recording. Rea started out performing with a local group called Magdalene, taking David Coverdale's place; the band won a national talent contest in 1975 as the Beautiful Losers, but still failed to get a record contract…

Chris Rea's voice is like the smoke off a prairie fire or the sparks and flame from a flint and steel. Coupled with his robust, tasteful songwriting, the effect is to pull the listener into a song or album, grabbing at the brain – not just the ears. Auberge is the follow-up to Road to Hell, an ambitious, dark-toned album that found European and critical success…

2011 album from the veteran British singer, songwriter and guitarist, his first album of new material in over 10 years. This stripped back studio album features 'Dancing My Blues Away', 'Never Tie Me Down', 'The Chance Of Love', 'Rock & Roll Tonight' and more…

Liberated from the shackles of major-label demands and the strictures of other people's expectations, Chris Rea has nailed his newly unadulterated colours–the blues, of course–firmly to the mast on the eloquently tranquil jazz of Blue Street, the follow-up to his corner-turning personal exorcism Dancing Down the Stony Road and one of four simultaneous releases on his newly created and independently minded Jazzee Blue label. Unashamedly self-satisfying, as chilled-out as a cool pool on a baking summer's day and almost entirely instrumental (the vocals do finally appear on "Still Going to a Go Go", one of those time-honoured hoarse-throated cogitations on the way life deals the cards) this is another refined offering from a man who just loves the sweet, slow sounds of collectable vintage guitars and whose former role as the archdeacon of the drivetime adult-rock chorus seems strangely distant.