Now Playing! Great Music From Great Motion Pictures
August 12, 2007
A/AS-23 – Now Playing! (Great Music from Great Motion Pictures) – Various Artists [1963] Artists: Carol Lawrence/Victor Feldman/Harry Betts/Elmer Bernstein/Pete Jolly/Dick Hazard
Rarity Level: ***
Cover Kitsch Level: **
Music Kitsch Level: **
Overall Score: ***
Acquired: Goodwill, Lilburn GA
Price: $1.01
Acquisition Notes: Typical Saturday morning find from a Goodwill that always produces.
Review:
This album on MGM’s budget AVA label actually provided more interest and value than The IP expected. The predominant performer/arrangers are Elmer Bernstein and Harry Betts, both well-respected and successful movie-score men. In fact, Harry Betts arranged one of The IP’s favorite surf movie scores for The Fantastic Plastic Machine. But that’s another story. On to the review of Now Playing!
The overarching theme of this LP is that each song on it is from a movie nominated for the Academy Awards of 1963; this means that the movies were released in 1962, coincidental with the year of The IP’s birth. Curiously, rather than the typical movie score album that is all covers by one band, Now Playing! features an interesting mix of original performers and curious covers that make it a keeper. The movies that produced the songs on this LP are a mix of the well-known and not-so-well-known:
Click on the titles for info on the movies
The evidently ubiquitous Carol Lawrence innocuously starts off the LP with her version Henry Mancini’s hit Days of Wine and Roses. Complete pabulum with cheesy backup singers; makes The IP want to hear Mancini’s version. Not horrible, but horribly banal.
What’s this? The theme from one of -if not THE- epic films of all time, Lawrence of Arabia, being played by a Jazz trio? This short-lived 2:15 track by the Victor Feldman Trio makes this album worth the price of admission ($1.01).
Harry Betts takes a Bossa Nova approach (all the rage at the time) in his arrangement of A Second Chance from the movie Two For The Seesaw. It’s a more pleasant listening experience than the earlier track by Carol Lawrence, but not by much. The “Bill Brown Singers,” whoever the heck they are, ruin what might be a cool, Bossa Nove instrumental track.
Elmer Bernstein proves his composing and arranging prowess with his theme from Walk on The Wildside. Always a winner, even when covered by other artists.
The acting, rather than the music, carried the day for the movie To Kill a Mockingbird, so much so that one might never have known that Elmer Bernstein wrote the music. This track proves that point, with its rather generic piano tinkling and subdued orchestration. Whatever.
The first track of Side Two of Now Playing! presents a complete and appreciated departure from the last track of Side One. Pete Jolly Trio & Friends apply the Bossa Nova trope to the To Kill a Mockingbird theme. Like the Victor Feldman Jazz track on Side One, this one leaves the listener wanting more. And Pete Jolly is an unexpected bonus to be included on such an album.
Whoever those Bill Brown Singers are, they again ruin an otherwise…well, this time the music sucks too. They are “singing” on a arrangement by one “Dick Hazard.” The name says enough. This song, at least as performed here, is more than forgettable.
Ready for some more Bossa Nova? The IP told you that it was all the rage in 1963. Here we have Harry Betts trying to make the most of a bad situation. What might that be? He has to work with those damn Bill Brown Singers! But Betts must have known how to browbeat these horrible vocalists into a slight submission; most of their “singing” on this track is actually of the “doo-doo-doo, da-da-da” variety that actually goes well with a Bossa Nova beat. In short: passable.
This Elmer Bernstein track (Follow Me) for the 1962 version of Mutiny on The Bounty is another throw-away, with a pseudo-Bolero sound that is, to this writer, more than a bit embarrassing. Hey, whatever works.
This LP ends with another Harry Betts Bossa Nova interpretation of a song from the movie Gypsy. Again, Betts manages to keep those intrusive Bill Brown Singers at bay, at least for most of the song…Hey…maybe I’m being too hard on these Bill Brown Singers…They didn’t sound so bad the third time around. Then again, I’m on my third beer.
As mentioned earlier, the few authentic Jazz tracks by Victor Feldman and Pete Jolly make this thrift store LP a keeper, as long as it’s under $1.01. That’s what The IP pays at the Goodwill where he got it. The Harry Betts tracks are just “OK.” The Bill Brown Singers are like a virus that infects any song they are on. The Elmer Berstein theme from Walk on The Wild Side can be found on the actual soundtrack album of the same name.
All in all, The IP was pleased by this LP, if not overwhelmed.
