None More Bing

Possibly the first LP [long-playing record - Ed.] I ever heard. From '58, it represents everything good from an era about to be ended by rock n' roll. Two great voices blending like peanut butter and jelly into a sequence of songs too modest to call itself a concept - a voyage around the world in song!

Let's take a voyage around that cover first. A commercial art masterpiece from when the big record companies employed talented in-house art departments, everything fits harmoniously, the layout, the typography, the colors. They built a set for Bing and Rosie to pose in. The wardrobe department kitted them out in some swell threads, and the make-up artist even faked "panda eyes" from an imaginary ski-slope. These days [an old person grumbles - Ed.] an instagram snapshot is enough; a few bare trees or some miserable girl hiding her face in her hair. Or a fucking badly-drawn owl. Or a grim bloke with a beard standing up to his waist in water. Any old shit goes. Anything to avoid looking professional. But look at this, to cheer yourself up. It's a shame you can't turn it over, because there's a swell map [lo-fi indie band - Ed.] with their route marked, and some snappy liner [sleeve - Ed.] notes.

Then there's the music. Billy May arranged it and his band played it, and that guarantees it swings like a donkey's nuts. The songs are chosen for geographical appropriateness, and the lyrics are frequently, and delightfully, adapted to the personalities and the times. Bing sings "when Elvis bows, I just nod", and Dino's pizzas get a product placement, as does Bob Hope's nose. It's all unforced, unironic, guileless, but very smart, fun.

And remember that Bing was a legendary mellow toker, and sucking on a hemp straw between songs. Remember too that he invented the close-up microphone technique, and nobody who knew him or worked with him had an unkind word to say about him (that vicious slur about him scuppering his brother's career is just that). And remember Rosie, in addition to being a swell gal and a swooningly accomplished chantoozie, was George Clooney's aunt.

So, probably the first album I ever heard, and I've been listening to it with undiminished pleasure for six decades or so. You should be so lucky.

EDIT: Lookee here! You can pretend you flipped over the cover while you're digging the tunes! Note how album is TRUE STEREO. In '58!!