Category Archives: Video

Various Artists: Wall of Sound – The Very Best of Phil Spector

Leave a reply

Fresh mono transfer and remaster of Spector’s best

In the lull between the primordial spark of ‘50s rock ‘n’ roll and the ‘60s echo brought by the British Invasion, Phil Spector reinvented the pop single. He broke into the music industry in the late ‘50s with his group, The Teddy Bears, and subsequently elevated the stature of “record producer” with his unique Wall of Sound methods. Starting in New York, and eventually decamping to Los Angeles, Spector’s fame eclipsed that of his artists. Though the Ronettes and Crystals got star billing, and the A-list studio players got their historic due as the Wrecking Crew, these singles have collectively become known as “Phil Spector records.” And given Spector’s reclusive lifestyle and his 2009 incarceration, the records are more than ever his public legacy.

This 19-track collection samples the key years, 1961-66, during which Spector produced for his own Philles label. With the Philles catalog now in the licensing hands of Sony Legacy and EMI, the fiftieth anniversary of the label’s 1961 founding is being celebrated with a new round of reissues. Alongside this remastered collection of Spector’s hits are collections for the Ronettes, Crystals and Darlene Love. This set stretches from the Crystals’ and Philles’ first single, 1961’s “There’s No Other (Like My Baby),” through the 1966 release whose chart failure is reported to have broken Spector’s heart, Ike & Tina Turner’s “River Deep, Mountain High.” In between are key sides from the Ronettes, Darlene Love, Bob B. Soxx and the Blue Jeans, Righteous Brothers and more from the Crystals, gathering together all of the label’s Top 40 singles except for three mid-60s releases by the Righteous Brothers.

This is a great look at the peaks, both commercial and artistic, of Spector’s run at Philles. It’s missing the warm-up act of pre-Philles sides with Ray Peterson, Gene Pitney, Curtis Lee and the Paris Sisters, as well as Spector’s comeback work in the ‘70s and 80s, but as a single disc overview of the Wall of Sound, and given the per-track royalty model for U.S. releases, it’s hard to argue with the choices. To reach deeper into the Phil Spector and Philles catalogs, to hear B-sides, album tracks and the few non-charting Philles singles, seek out the individual artist collections being issued in parallel, dig up a copy of the out-of-print box set Back to Mono, or spring for the imported Phil Spector Masters. This isn’t the vault archaeology that fans seek, and many will complain about the mono line-up (all except “River Deep”), but it is a welcome overview of one of pop music’s greatest auteurs. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Perry Como: Seattle

Leave a reply

Easy listening vocalist rocks out, but only momentarily

Como’s 1969 LP opens with a number, “Happiness Comes, Happiness Goes,” that suggests the easy listening pop vocalist was late getting to a groovy party hosted by Esquivel. But after only one groovy concoction of fuzz guitars and organ, the album reverts to the light, warm pop that Mister C had been landing on the charts since the early 1940s. The album’s hit was a remake of “Seattle,” the theme to television’s Here Come the Brides. It’s upbeat harpsichord, organ and horns cracked the Top 40 and reached #2 on the adult contemporary chart. The album’s other period piece is “That’s All This Old World Needs,” whose optimism was a better fit for August’s Woodstock than December’s Altamont. Working with RCA staff producers Andy Wiswell and Chet Atkins, Como selected a range of material, including the Brothers Four’s melancholy hit, “Turnaround,” the cheery, Mitch Miller-y “Deep in Your Heart,” and the bluesy “Beady Eyed Buzzard.” Como also recorded a pair of tunes from the legendary Cindy Walker, and his work with Atkins in the famed “Nashville Sound” studio gives several tracks a pop-country feel. Como was perhaps the very easiest of easy listening vocalists, but the lack of pyrotechnics in his vocal style made records recorded in his late ‘50s as smoothly ingratiating as those waxed in his younger years. Don’t be fooled by the opening track, this is a solid easy-pop album with ‘60s pop-country colors. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Perry Como Discography

The Making of the Ronettes’ “Be My Baby”

Leave a reply

Perhaps the most perfect pop single of all time. Here are some YouTube videos that play the song in various stages of completeness. The first features the instrumental backing, and really highlights the emotional power of Hal Blaine’s drumming. The second adds in the backing vocals, which standout more than in the final, full production, which is third.

Jonny: Jonny

Leave a reply

Teenage Fanclub meets Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci

Teenage Fanclub’s Norman Blake and Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci’s Euros Childs have more melodicism in the tip of their respective pinkies than most musicians create in their entire careers. Paired together for their first full-length collaboration, the results are a brilliantly crafted cocktail of their respective bands, ‘60s British invasion and garage pop, canyon country, ‘70s power pop, pub and light rock, and ‘80s post-punk psychedelia. Like XTC’s Dukes of Stratosphear, there’s an element of spot-the-influence here, but the references are more fully digested and fleeting: a vocal harmony that suggests Curt Boettcher, CS&N or America, a melody hook that recalls the Kasnetz-Katz bubblegum factory, a stomping rhythm you’d have heard from Brisnley Schwarz, or an organ riff that lodges the Monkees in your ear.

The opening “Wich is Wich” would have made a terrific theme song to an H.R. Pufnstuf spin-off, and the nearly eleven-minute “Cave Dance” could be, for those who remember that Pufnstuf lived in a cave, both a stoneage dance sensation and a low-key escape from the powers of Witchiepoo. Unsurprisingly, the pair create buoyant, winsome music, but with just enough melancholy and angst to keep the sweetness from dissolving your teeth. Even the album’s first single, “Candyfloss,” crosses its lyrical dream woman in a duet vocal whose Motors-like harmony is laden with discontent. There are a few lesser tunes, but they quickly disappear as you indulge in the yearning of “Circling the Sun” and “I Want to Be Around,” tap your toe to the country-inspired “I’ll Make Her My Best Friend,” and glory in the duo’s irresistible melodies. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Stream the Jonny album
Download a free Jonny EP

Frankie Lymon: Rock ‘n’ Roll

Leave a reply

Teenager steps out for 1958 solo debut

After two successful years fronting the Teenagers, vocalist Frankie Lymon stepped into a surprisingly unsuccessful solo career with this fine 1958 studio album. Having lost his childhood soprano to adolescence, his 16-year-old voice still had plenty of punch, and continued to leap from the grooves. His out-of-breath delivery of “Waitin in School” has an adolescent everything-is-happening-at-once fervor that Ricky Nelson’s cool-cat style didn’t match. It doesn’t hurt to have an ace guitar player – Mickey Baker, perhaps – tearing thing up in the breaks. Producers Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore double the vocals on “Wake Up Little Suzie,” creating a more saucy mood than the Everly’s original, and though covers of the Rays’ “Silhouettes” and the Coasters’ “Searchin’” aren’t particularly inspiring, there’s still plenty here to impress. Lymon’s adolescence adds a note of sweet longing to Nat King Cole’s “Send for Me,” and the R&B “Next Time You See Me” and “Short Fat Fanny” give Lymon a chance to really wail. Most impressive are original approaches to “Jailhouse Rock” and “Diana” that pay each song its due without imitating the hits. Several of these tracks were released as singles, but none had the success of the early Teenagers’ sides; worse, with a heroin habit eating away his abilities, Lymon was dropped by Roulette in 1961. He’d record a few sides for other labels, but this album and a handful of non-LP singles for Roulette (that should have been included here as bonus tracks) represents the end of Lymon’s run as a bright thread in the rock ‘n’ roll tapestry. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

RIP John Barry

Leave a reply

Five-time Oscar-winning composer John Barry has passed away at the age of 77. Barry is best known for his scores for numerous James Bond films, including the contested authorship of the series’ theme. Though a court awarded credit for the iconic theme to Monty Norman, Barry remained associated with the work throughout his life. More impressively, he authored signature music for dozens of films, including Born Free, Midnight Cowboy, The Lion in Winter, Somewhere in Time, Out of Africa, Body Heat, and Chaplin. Starting in the late ’50s he also wrote pop-jazz for his own John Barry Seven, producing singles and albums, such as Stringbeat, and teaming with vocalist Adam Faith for songs in the film Beat Girl. Many of Barry’s film scores are available on CD and for download, and you can find a sampler of his work on The Best of John Barry and the multidisc John Barry: The Collection.

Jack Nitzsche: The Lonely Surfer

Leave a reply

Solo debut of legendary pop arranger

Producer, arranger, soundtrack composer and songwriter Jack Nitzsche had only brief chart fame under his own name, with the title track of this album having reached #39 on the singles chart in 1963. But it was under the names of the Crystals, Ronettes, Ike & Tina Turner, the Rolling Stones and dozens of others that his memorable arrangements, orchestrations, and in the case of the Seachers’ “Needles and Pins,” songs, had their most significant impact on the pop market. For his full album follow-up to the fluke hit single, Nitzsche penned a handful of original tunes and charted new orchestrations for pop standards and movie themes, including a swinging run at Elmer Bernstein’s theme from “The Magnificent Seven” and a dramatic rendering of “More,” the theme from Mondo Cane. He borrows his own hook from “Needles and Pins” for the Mexicali-tinged “Puerto Vallarta,” and the string line of “Theme for a Broken Heart” seems to be drawn from Jagger & Richards’ “Blue Turns to Grey.” There’s plenty of low twanging baritone guitar and tympani throughout, demonstrating Nitzsche’s mastery of weaving together pop and orchestral elements. Apart from the title track, a cover of Lee Hazlewood’s “Baja” (which was a contemporaneous hit for the Astronauts), and the bass-twanging “Beyond the Surf,” there’s nothing here that really even feints towards surf music. The album closes with a morose arrangement of “Da Doo Ron Ron” so deeply at odds with the joy of the Crystals’ hit single as to be virtually unrecognizable. This is a pleasant album of orchestral pop, but other than the title track, not nearly as memorable as Nitzsche’s arrangements for Spector and others. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Jack Nitzsche Tribute Page

Various Artists: Today’s Top Girl Groups, Vol. 1

Leave a reply

1998 sampler of international lo-fi, punk and girlgroup sounds

After several Rock Don’t Run volumes [1 2 3] of mostly male bands, Spinout collected sixteen girl groups for this 1998 release. But other than Sit ‘n’ Spin’s note-perfect homage to the sixties, this is more punk rock than girl group. There’s primitive Merseybeat from Japan’s Pebbles and 5,6,7,8s, buzzing post-punk from San Francisco’s Poontwang, Ramones-like intensity from The Neanderdolls and Bobbyteens, and garage rock from Holly Golightly and Greece’s Meanie Geanies. The Neptunas give a swinging instrumental surf spin to Max Frost & the Trooper’s “Shapes of Things to Come,” the Friggs’ drum-and-guitar heavy “Juiced Up” brings to mind the late, lamented Pandoras, and the Maybellines’ Bo Diddley beat was studied at the feet of the Strangeloves. Best of all, though, is the drums-bass-and-grunting of the Godzillas’ “Pass the Hatchet.” If the Litter had made soundtrack music for the softcore porn scene of an AIP cheapie film, it would have, if we were lucky, sounded like this track. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Wanda Jackson: The Party Ain’t Over

Leave a reply

Jack White overwhelms a still-fiery Wanda Jackson

It’s a mark of Wanda Jackson’s enduring vocal fire that the uniqueness of her voice can be heard through the bombast with which producer Jack White has surrounded her. As on her earliest recordings, Jackson’s voice hangs half-way between girlish and womanly, the giggle of the former adding to the experience of the latter. But track after track, Jackson’s dwarfed by White’s production, overwhelming her substantial charms with cacophonous outbursts and circus-band theatrics that shrink, rather than magnify the vocalist’s stature. The horns sound like a drunk commandeering the microphone at a wedding, hailing themselves rather than punctuating the emotion of Jackson’s vocals. The voice processing sounds cold and artificial and White’s guitar, particularly on covers of “Shakin’ All Over” and “Nervous Breakdown,” sounds more like a Woodstock freakout than something to complement the queen of rockabilly. White finally gives in on the closing cover of Jimmie Rodgers “Blue Yodel #6,” dismissing the band, pulling out his acoustic, and giving both his guitar playing and Jackson’s impassioned vocal some room to roam. Jack White’s fans may very well love this album, as it seems to be more about him than about his vocalist. With any luck this will lead new listeners to Jackson’s magnificent catalog (check out Ace’s Queen of Rockabilly for an overview of her rockin’ side); those who joined the bandwagon decades ago may find the basic four-piece on her previous album, I Remember Elvis, the all-star salute of Heart Trouble, or Jackson’s earlier reintroduction on Rosie Flores’ Rockabilly Filly, more to their liking. The rock ‘n’ roll combos of these earlier albums generate more excitement – by shining their light on Jackson – than White does with more players and higher volume. Wanda Jackson’s still got it, but Jack White doesn’t seem to know what to do with it. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]

Wanda Jackson’s Home Page

The Anita Kerr Singers: All You Need is Love

Leave a reply

Soft-pop vocal arrangements of ‘60s hits

The Anita Kerr singers are among the most heard, and least known-by-name, vocal group in the history of recording. That’s because Kerr’s group was the go-to backing group (along with the Jordanaires) for hundreds of sessions during the Nashville Sound era of the early ‘60s. They appeared almost constantly on the charts backing top country hits by Jim Reeves, Ernest Tubb, Faron Young, Brenda Lee, pop records by Pat Boone, Perry Como, Bobby Vinton and many, many others. Alongside their choral work, the group recorded several albums for RCA, including the Grammy winning We Dig Mancini. In the mid-60s Kerr disbanded the Nashville edition of her group, convened a new edition in Los Angeles, and commenced recording for Warner Brothers. This is the group’s fourth, and last album for the label, and was originally issued in the flower-power year of 1967.

Kerr picked her material with an arranger’s ear for possibilities, finding new vocal interplay even in songs as originally complex as the Association’s “Never My Love.” The songs are drawn from pop, rock, folk, soul and easy listening, and Kerr’s arrangements and orchestrations always find something new, often with a vocal-jazz feel. She expands on the vocal work of the Mamas & Papas “No Salt on Her Tail” and turns the Bee Gees’ moody “Holiday” into something contemplative. Less successful are her transformations of the soul tunes, “A Natural Woman” and “How Can I Be Sure.” The album is more a period piece than the lasting art Kerr created with her hit background arrangements, but it remains a pleasant breeze that blew across the heavier rock and soul of the ‘60s. [©2011 hyperbolium dot com]