I am working on my AMAZON review so I can post it when I am allowed, BUT:
SPOILERS AHEAD - Do not READ IF YOU WANT TO HEAR THE CD FIRST:
DO NOT READ ANYMORE IF YOU WANT TO HEAR THE CD FIRST:
DO NOT READ ANYMORE IF YOU WANT TO HEAR THE CD FIRST:
New Guy In Town - Guy Haines:
Great packaging, great liner notes and photographs. Song selection a bit more arcane than Haines His Way, the first Guy Haines CD.
All of the songs are well done. The orchestrations are first rate, and the musicians know their stuff. The easy-going Haines style is matched perfectly by clever arrangements that are sweet but never cloying.
First two songs are pleasant enough. "On Your Toes" has the type of lyric that Lorenz Hart was the master of - mix that with a Richard Rodgers tune and you have a toe-tapper that is bound to become a favorite. Rodgers and Hart will make a brief appearance on another tune on the CD. Next up "They Don't Give Medals (To Yesterday's Heroes)" - this song was new to me, but because it was Bacharach and David, it was familiar at the same time. A good kind of familiar, with that bouncing rhythm and those clever rhymes - so typical of the B/D hits of the late 1960's.
Next track is the first home run of the game. Haines and Jessica Rush take dePaul and Mercer's "I'm Past My Prime" from LI'L ABNER and make it a delicious duet that has you imagining them in costume! The lyrics and music are as fresh and perfect as the day they were written!
Next few songs I will cover in MORE detail for AMAZON.
Second home run: "Love Look Away" from FLOWER DRUM SONG - BK proclaims this song perfection, and I must agree. It has always been my favorite Rodgers and Hammerstein "want" song - and it is a treat to hear it sung by a male singer. Haines places the intro midway thru the song, instead of at the beginning where I am used to hearing it, but damn if it doesn't work! More than one tear was shed during this tune.
BK is, I think, a bit too generous to the originator of the next song (one he wrote himself) in the liner notes , but he acquits himself nicely with it.
Third home run:
"Millions of Men" - a Jones & Schmidt song that I only know from the WHAT IF? DVD. Haines does it wonderfully and the piano by John Boswell is superb. Although for now, for me, this song still belongs to Paul Haber, Haines is no slouch in his interpretation - this version will also be definitive.
Rest of the songs to be covered at AMAZON - but wanted to share my first reactions, which of course are MY OPINION ONLY.
It is a CD that has a great pedigree and that lives up to its lofty ambitions. Guy Haines is back with a new CD and Bruce Kimmel is back with a new label. All's right with the world....at least the world as we know it.
