Popular culture - and Sinatra built the stage for Elvis to step onto - created the greatest art of the twentieth century. Art that spoke directly to people who gave a shit about "art" but knew when their hearts and feet and minds were moved. America in the twentieth century, for all its faults (spoiler - this is earth, not heaven) produced the greatest art the world had seen, articulated by the huddled masses for their own pleasure. But the millennial clock ticked over, and that time in the sun is gone. There is no new Sinatra. There isn't even a new Robert Goulet.
Live In Seattle '57 is a rarity (for which we can thank my friend Scotch) originally a bootleg and eventually released in 1999. Nelson Riddle swings the baton for nineteen of the greatest songs ever written, a live recording that many Sinatra fans rate as his finest. Play a little loud. Get a little drunk.
And while you watch the doc, reflect a little on two of the women in his life: the incomparable Ava Gardner, who broke his heart and always spoke the truth, and the poisonous Mia Farrow, who couldn't speak a word of it, and still can't.
ReplyDeleteThere's a "woody lie?" just waiting in the wings to pounce here...
ReplyDeleteSoon ye shall see the [What? - Ed.] hit the fanboys...
O.K., I'm done. Hand over your Eeee! Tickets, whosoever next up for the Orgasmatron...
When our youngerchild was 5 she fell for "Frankie Boy" and his smooth stylin's to the utter delight of my Sinatra lovin' mother. She--kid, not mother--went on to be an ATX tween/teen music biz wunderkind, lol. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
ReplyDeleteI'd love to share "Live in Seattle '57" with both of them
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thank you!
Deleteeven in my teens in the mid 1960's, before now, when we sleepwalk and think ourselves awakened, miraculously insightful and suddenly floating about the universe in a cloud of grace, i had a problem with sinatra and myself.
Deletewhy could i not believe what he sang? his unparalelled phrasing, intonation and god-like musicality cannot be questioned. but i felt a deep coldness in his love confessions. i still do. but i also still need to hear them. thank you.
It's worth remembering that Sinatra pretty much invented the heartbroken confessional of the torch song - and if you're not moved by (say) In The Wee Small Hours there's probably something not ready in you, rather than a coldness you're feeling in the music. He restrains his passion, articulating those great songs with respect and elegance and a total lack of self-pity. Nobody ever inhabited a song like Sinatra. The lack of veins throbbing at his temples and tears in his eyes doesn't mean he's cold. He's burning up.
DeleteWhen I was in my teens, and taking acid, of course Sinatra meant nothing to me. But that awakening was real - a cosmic experience. Easy to sneer now, and it looks trite set in a blog comment (or anywhere else, I imagine), but it set that generation apart from any other. The counterculture (again, sneer) was built on it, and the expectations of societal change based on the change in consciousness brought about by LSD. The age of Aquarius never dawned, but that was the hope, and a great one to have, and the music was new because of it. The "wokeness" of this generation is based on a few lazily-thought out ideas about not causing offence, and adding berry flavors to beer. A generation - two, now - with nothing to do but blame and whine. Where IS their Sinatra? Their Beatles? Even pre-covid their culture was a joyless wasteland. Individually, of course, they can be fine and lovely people, but as a youth culture, a movement, as a creative and political force, they're a bust, and their endlessly referential music reflects that.
My favorite live Sinatra album, I bought it as soon as it came out, although Sinatra at The Sands with the Basie Band gives it a run for its money, and Mrs Candyside prefers Live in Paris.
ReplyDeleteWhile we're here - here's Sinatra At The Sands:
Delete🥃🥃
Sinatra at The Sands was, of course, the favourite album of John Gee who was manager of the Marquee Club in Wardour Street in the Sixties.
DeleteThere is an apocryphal tale: "It was often mooted that all that was needed to get your group a gig there was to engage John in conversation and make sure he was aware that your greatest hero/influence was Sinatra."
https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2014/jul/09/john-gee-obituary
My Canadian ex used to tell what I thought was a tale about her mother and Frank. One day, we were moving around some books she had, and there was one about Sinatra. I opened it, and it had a handwritten note and signature from Frank to her mom.
ReplyDeleteexcellent
DeleteI don't exactly remember how it was worded, but it def implied that there had been a roamntic liason. Apparently, the Canadien's father was in the mob and knew Frank. Her dad died from cancer, and a few years later, she apparently had a dalliance with senor azul eyes.
DeleteFrank-ee-eee-ee!!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Mr. III.
Talking of "Cool as fuck', I have been playing your Lalo and Dizzy, Free Ride album, superb.
ReplyDeleteDon't miss Art Farmer's Crawl Space, for addedd coolness!
DeleteSwell, pally.
ReplyDeleteI do recommend that Netflix pic, if you can get it.
DeleteAnd who can forget:
ReplyDelete"To do, is to be." - Socrates
"To be, is to do." - Sartre
"Do-be-do-be-do." - Sinatra
I've had an email from a friend saying he can't see the emoticons which act as links in the comments, and blames it on Bill Gates. Are there any other Microsoft users out there who can't see the microphone and the glasses of Scotch in my comments?
ReplyDeleteEmoticons are working perfectly!
DeleteIt's too bad that Sinatra's place in the world must now exist as a purely nostalgic affair because it is almost impossible to appreciate his essence in such a context. That many people are from his era is a special treat that becomes more and more special... as it gets closer and closer to non-existence. Someday, this recording will be valued as a novelty rather than historical. That will only serve to beg the question:
What have we gained...and, what have we lost?
Thank you, Farq, and Scotch!
No more nostalgic than any of the other music featured here, Kwai, as it is all, by definition, recorded in the past, which is where nostalgia likes to hang out. I don't generally buy nostalgia a drink at the bar, because whenever the music plays it's more real than his stories.
DeleteI'm on a old Mac, and can't see the the emoticons either. Probably need to put some more memory in the box, but that may be beyond my ability.
DeleteI think it's a browser "issue". I'll go back to Stealth Links, which are universally irritating across all platforms.
DeleteThirteen year old iMac (OSX El Capitan!) with a Firefox browser shows the microphone, but "01F943" placeholders for the other. I've put in a ticket with the I.T. desk.
DeleteThis Windows 10 user is having no problems.
DeleteRight on! We listen to mid-century pop vocal (and instrumental) music as much as Rock these days in the MrDave household and of course no one does it better than Frankie. I thought I had pretty much his entire catalog but somehow this one escaped my grasp -- thank you! Not only do we not have great interpreters any more, we've got nothing to interpret! Instead of Rodgers & Hart, Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Jerome Kern, Hoagy Carmichael, et. al., we've got Max Martin and friends churning out hit after hit of regurgitated assembly line pap. The Great American Songbook and it's many interpreters is certainly an unparalleled achievement to treasure.
ReplyDeleteOur time left is limited, and it makes no sense to spend it on "new culture" just because it's new. Newness has become its only marketable property, a currency in itself. Doesn't matter what it is - movie, music, sneakers, game - as long as it's new it's consumable. We are in a culture that eats new. Yet all recorded music was recorded in the past. Whether it's Max Martin or Sinatra, it's recorded music, happened in the past. The "newness" is as illusory as the "oldness". It's quality that matters, quality and craft allied to passion and inspiration. "New culture" is dead - a downward spiral of self-referential echoes of what went before. Listen to "good", not "new", because what was good is good. What's a few years in the cosmic scheme of things? Indistinguishable from a few days.
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