You always smile, but in your eyes your sorrow shows

Continuing my trip up Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Albums Of All Time...

#282 : In The Wee Small Hours - Frank Sinatra (1955)

In the Wee Small Hours, the first collection of songs Frank Sinatra recorded specifically for an LP, sustains a midnight mood of loneliness and lost love — it’s a prototypical concept album. From the title track, brought in on the bell tones of a celesta, through a trenchant recast of “This Love of Mine,” a hit from his Tommy Dorsey days, Sinatra — reeling from his breakup with Ava Gardner — is never less than superb.

I'm perfectly happy to admit I like a bit of Frank - it doesn't strike me that he was the nicest man out there, but he put some decent tracks together in his time.  I've never listened to anything other than a "best of" though, so was interested to listen to this.  And well - he's got a lovely voice but, on this album at least, he's sounding a bit sorry for himself and it's all a bit dull really, without nothing jumping out at me.

In its defence, Wikipedia points out that albums like this didn't really exist at the time - they were really just collections of singles, generally released on 10 inch discs (whereas this was available as 2 10 inch discs or 1 12 inch - that's progress for you!).  It also makes the point that it has a very warm sound for a mono recording - and his general sad sound actually made the public more accepting of his relationship with Ava Gardner (which had ended by this time).  This album (along with his acting) also rescued his career - there was a feeling before this that he was kinda over the hill.  He was in his late 30s after all!  His Wikipedia entry is massive and I really couldn't face it - I suspect there will be one or two more opportunities to visit it.  "Customers also listened to" other Frank albums and albums by other Rat Pack members.  An interesting listen, but it didn't quite click for me, I'm afraid.

#281 : Nilsson Schmilsson - Harry Nilsson (1971)

A brilliant outlier on the Seventies L.A. singer-songwriter scene, Harry Nilsson had a voice and pop savvy like Paul McCartney and a biting ironic side like John Lennon. Nilsson Schmilsson produced three hits — the oddball island novelty “Coconut,” a cover of Badfinger’s “Without You,” where Nilsson sounds like a depressed Barry Manilow, and the surprise monster jam “Jump Into the Fire.” Nilsson was later covered by LCD Soundsystem. It was par for the course for a guy who could shruggingly pull off anything he wanted.

I knew "Without You" but wasn't aware it was a cover - apparently Badfinger were a big thing back in the day, but I must admit to knowing nothing at all about them and it's fair to say things didn't end well, with two of the band committing suicide.  I was aware however that "Without You" wasn't entirely representative of Harry's work, so didn't quite know what to expect from this album.  And having listened to it, I'm not entirely sure what I heard - it's an odd mix.  In some places it's VERY middle of the road and in other places it's more definitely not.  It reminded me a bit of Billy Joel in places - generally decent enough songs which sometimes work well, but sometimes both of them just don't seem to know when to leave things alone.   But "Coconut" is a very odd track indeed - and I knew I was going to regret it, but I couldn't stop myself listening to the Dannii Minogue cover version.  And boy, did I regret it.

The Wikipedia entry for the album is amazingly short for a US #3 album which was his most successful work commercially - my suspicion is that Harry doesn't attract the rabid kind of fans required for in-depth Wikiwork, although how anyone could resist a man who decides a dressing gown is the best thing to wear on his album cover is beyond me.  Amusingly, his Wikipedia entry tells me his last album, although never released, was going to be called Papa's Got A Brown New Robe, which does suggest he wasn't exactly a man of extravagant tastes.  His entry gives the impression of a man who did what he wanted artistically without overly worrying about the commercialism, which is nice in some ways - but a bit of a shame given that his financial advisor stole all his money and it sounds like he never recovered financially.  And I feel terrible about it, but the fact I found most interesting is that Mama Cass and Keith Moon both died in his flat (and both at the age of 32 - don't do drugs, kids.  Or at least not as many as Keith, anyway)

"Customers also listened to" The Mamas and The Papas (spooky coincidence!) and 10cc (who I can see have a similar artistic leaning).  But I'm still not entirely sure what I think of the album - it's not really my kind of thing, but I somehow managed to found it both interesting and boring at the same time, which has intrigued me.  And "Without You" is a fine song, even if you REALLY don't want to hear me singing along to it.

#280 : Get Rich Or Die Tryin' - 50 Cent (2002)

The backstory — promising street rapper gets shot nine times and lives to make a classic debut — was irresistible. So were the precision-engineered beats and hooks 50 Cent cooked up with his new mentor, Dr. Dre. Through a mixture of melody and menace, 50 enraptured the suburbs with “In da Club” and antagonized an entire generation of his peers on “Many Men.” His hulking figure, physically and metaphorically, loomed over the rap charts for years, teaching a generation of artists that nothing sold like fear itself.

Before I listened to this, I was firmly of the opinion it would fall into the "hip hop I don't like" category - but I actually didn't mind a surprising amount of it, and the tracks where he works with others generally work quite well.  But I do find the whole "ooooh look at me, I'm such a tough guy" thing a little boring - I appreciate that he has actually lived that life (unlike some of his contemporaries) but that doesn't mean he has to go on about it all the time.  I also imagine all the teenagers from rough hoods like mine (the mean streets of St Albans, don't you know) "really relating to it" when they patently don't have a clue.  I would also say it felt a whole lot longer than the 53 minutes playing time, which suggests it was dragging somewhat by the end.

Wikipedia is surprisingly terse about the album - it feels like the sort of thing they'd normally go on and on about forever.  Apart from noting the global sales of approx 10 million, the only other thing that held my interest was the following random snippet "In the 2017 video game Paradigm, one of the records found inside Paradigm's home is Get Rich or Die of Natural Causes" which amused me, but seems a completely random thing to include.  His Wikipedia entry is a depressing read featuring a lot of unpleasant behaviour which doesn't really paint anyone in the best of lights, so let's just skip over it.  "Customers also listened to" a load of rappy types, some of whom we've seen on this list, some of whom we haven't - but most of whom I struggle to hold an opinion on.  This is one I won't be revisiting though, I'm afraid.

Which gives us an interesting problem in that it feels extremely unlikely I'm going to come back to any of these albums.  I can see both Frank and Mr Cent have good arguments as to the influence of their albums, although Harry would struggle more on this front (and in Frank's case, I'm even prepared to accept his album lead to many better things - but 50 shouldn't attempt such an argument with me).  But I just found Frank's album too dull to reward - so I'm guessing I have to give it to Harry and his dressing gown, although I'd like to make it clear it would have been a distant third in many recent rounds.

#285-283 - Three albums I didn't hate, but didn't exactly like either
#279-277 - Are they REALLY that great?