Sunday Sin Job

Sinatra's partnership with Antonio Carlos Jobim was made in heaven. The first album dates from '67, and its success encouraged a follow-up in '69, and here's where the mystery starts.

SinatraJobim was briefly released on 8-track before Sinatra aborted the whole thing - as he had the right to do, owning the label. Acetates of the album exist, and the cartridge followed the track order, but the vinyl album was never pressed, not even as a bootleg [citation needed - Ed.]

As far as I can tell, nobody is 100% sure why. Sinatra had sudden doubts about its sales potential. He hated the cover. Whatever, he belatedly released most of the tracks in '71, but it wasn't until '91's Complete Reprise Studio Recordings that all the tracks from that second collaboration appeared. The last of them - Desafinado (Off Key) - may have had more to do with the cancellation of the album than is generally credited. Half of it is sung deliberately, and agonisingly, off key. It's a musical joke that doesn't come off.

And then there's that hated cover. It's a fairly crude, pre-Photoshop montage of Frank and bus unconvincingly parked in a forest for no good reason. Jobim is entirely absent. Here's an image from a recent publication, showing the bus in the Warners lot, taken from a photo shoot which supplied covers for other albums. Spot the differences? For some reason, the bus number is removed, and a different face, with a chirpier expression, 'shopped in. At least it looks that way. Why? Beats me.

And here's the back cover of the vinyl album that was never made. Another mystery. Made all the deeper by the fact that the track order does not follow the acetate and the 8-track. Nope, me neither. The track order on today's offering is the original.

Whatever, it's a superb album, although its Deodato arrangements are less bossa than the first, so it makes sense to have them separate rather than bunched together on a comp.