It took Pink Martini a full decade -- their debut, Sympathique, came out in 1997; the follow-up, Hang on Little Tomato, was released in 2004; and now Hey Eugene! arrives in 2007 -- but they've finally perfected their particular good-time blend of cabaret pop, pre-"world music" international fare, golden-age Hollywood scores, and lounge-informed, ...
In 1996, at the height of the lounge music craze, Capitol Records assembled the first Ultra-Lounge Christmas Cocktails collection. The label, founded in Los Angeles in 1942 to take advantage of the emerging solo singer trend that overtook the swing big bands, had an appropriate catalog for such an album, which was duly filled with vintage ...
Cha-cha music at its Whitest and most easy listening-friendly, recorded for Capitol in the 1950s and 1960s by Dean Martin, Julie London, Billy May, Martin Denny, Les Baxter, Walter Wanderley, and a number of other performers who are only coming to light in the lounge revival. Yma Sumac, Perez Prado, and Tito Rodriguez add a little (a very little) ...
As spage age bachelor pad music goes, this is among the goofiest and edgiest. This 14-song survey is heavy on two aspects of the cocktail kitsch genre: then-futuristic, now-primitive synthesizer squawks (Richard Hayman, Dick Hyman, Perrey-Kingsley) and double entendre sexual innuedos. Sometimes that double entendre was vocal, as in Julie London's ...
This 18-song compilation is the showbiz-encased, Vegas-ized school of late-'50s and early-'60s pop vocals. The emphasis is certainly more on the "cool" than the wild and swinging; if it ever breaks out a sweat, there will be a martini-dipped silk handkerchief on hand to wipe it away. You get selections from Rat Packers (Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, ...
This two-fer CD combines Hugo Winterhalter's early-'60s recordings Latin Gold and Hawaiian Wedding Song, originally released separately on RCA's budget label Camden. The albums had been out of print until they were reissued in 2004 on Collectables. This pleasant set features lite orchestral reworkings of such well-known songs as "Vaya con Dios," ...
As space age bachelor pad music goes, these were among the most widely heard examples of the genre. Over half of these 15 cuts, in fact, were hit singles, including such smashes as "Quiet Village" (Martin Denny), "So Rare" (Jimmy Dorsey), "Moritat" (Dick Hyman, and later to be changed into "Mack the Knife" by Bobby Darin), "Yellow Bird" (Arthur ...
Italian producer and label-boss Nicola Conte had zero problems drafting a lineup of producers for the remix album following on from his debut Jet Sounds (or Bossa per Due, in its American reissue). Stateside financiers Thievery Corporation balance the bossa with a little hip-hop for their redo of his breakout "Bossa per Due," while Japan's Kyoto ...
The organ has a respected slot in the space age pop/lounge lineup, and Organs in Orbit gives the Hammond its due by featuring 18 cuts in the style, originally recorded for Capitol in the 1950s and 1960s. It's a long way from here to Jimmy Smith, and you should check any hopes for funkiness at the door. If you've got a yen for the inimitable ...
As the title implies, the songs on this 18-song compilation were intended for bachelors who wanted to create a suitably suave atmosphere between the mid-'50s and mid-'60s. So although the music draws from jazz (both big band and cool), lounge pop, and film/TV soundtracks, it's primarily designed to set a mood or background. That means that when it ...
Three albums in and thanks to clever little touches here and there, Richard Cheese's "swankifying" of pop hits hasn't worn out its welcome. If you're not familiar, Cheese is a fake Las Vegas-styled lounge act who takes tracks like Mötley Crüe's "Girls, Girls, Girls" or Snoop Dogg's "Gin and Juice" and delivers them in a finger-snapping, Rat Pack ...
Christmas Cocktails, Vol. 2 is an entertaining but unspectacular collection of classic carols performed in a lounge fashion. For connoisseurs of kitsch, it's an entertaining disc, but other listeners might find the camp a little too much to take. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
The lounge sounds of the '50s and '60s on this compilation are very much of a piece with the other volumes of the Ultra-Lounge series. But as you'd expect from the title, the emphasis is on vintage lounge at its jazziest, with the saxophone to the fore. This isn't the kind of jazz you're going to read about in Down Beat, despite the presence of ...
An 18-song exhumation of the Capitol exotica back catalog, placing old standbys like Martin Denny, Les Baxter, and Yma Sumac alongside lesser-knowns like Webley Edwards, Bas Sheva, and the wonderfully-named 80 Drums Around the World. This favors easy listening-friendly exotica, rather than the style at its most outrageous. It may be too ...
On Richard Cheese's Christmas album, Silent Nightclub, it's laughable how far Cheese and his cohorts go to find songs that fit the holiday theme. "Personal Jesus"? Sure. "Do They Know It's Christmas"? Naturally. "Like a Virgin"? Reaching. "I Melt with You" -- um -- why, exactly? Actually, the record could go even further with the premise: why not ...
The lounge songs of the '50s and '60s on this compilation are all dominated by the pulsating rhythms of the bongo drum. As with other instrument-specific CDs in the Ultra Lounge series (Saxophobia, Organs in Orbit), it can be too much. However, there is some great mood music here, perfect for creating a Latin-tinted party ambience. "Taboo," by Leo ...
One of the kitschier installments in the Ultra Lounge series, Vol. 7, Crime Scene features a cross-section of easy-listening and movie music culled primarily from Capitol Records' vaults. All of the songs are allegedly "about" or inspired by detective and crime novels and films, so you have movie and television themes (Nelson Riddle's "The ...
Songs with a Parisian motif were a natural for bachelor pad music, the whole genre putting a premium on the sort of suave grace for which French culture is noted. Bien sur, when it's refracted through Hollywood easy listening musicians, you're getting a sound which is about as authentically French as french fries. But no matter -- bachelor pad ...
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