Ultra-Lounge, Vol. 8: Cocktail Capers (1996)

About this title: If you've been following the Ultra-Lounge series this far, you know what to expect: a mixture of stars (Les Baxter, Nelson Riddle) and no-names from the Capitol vaults, playing space age pop/cocktail music of all hues in the 1950s and 1960s. Yet this has an edge over most of the previous titles in the series: there's more of a sense of swing, groove, even (dare we say) danger on much of this, albeit danger of a very safe sort. Hints of rock'n'roll and spy music even creep in from time to time, with James Bond-type reverb guitar decorating cuts like Al Caiola's "Underwater Chase," and ... read more

Tracks:

1. Roller Coaster [Busch/DeLugg]
2. Hey, Bellboy! [Candoli/Mack]
3. This Could Be the Start of Something [Allen]
4. The Pink Panther Theme [Mancini]
5. Like Young [Previn/Webster]
6. Underwater Chase [Holmes]
7. Binga Banga Bongo/Percolator [Snyder/Bideau/Freem]
8. Call Me [Hatch]
9. Mountain Greenery [Rodgers/Hart]
10. Charade [Mancini/Mercer]
11. Shooting Star/Jungalero [Baxter]
12. Honorable Hong Kong Rock [May]
13. Odd Job Man/I Wanna Be a James Bond Girl [Holmes/Sherman]
14. Heap Big Chief [Strahl]
15. Blue Danube Rock [Harding]
16. Pussy Cat [Coleman/Schluger]
17. Teach Me Tiger [Tempo]
18. Lolita Ya-Ya [Riddle/Harris]
19. [Untitled Spoken Track]

Note: This is a general synopsis. Each listing is further described below.