I love your face - it's in the right place

Continuing my trip back through the 1968 album charts.

12/05/68 : 2 In 3 - Esther and Abi Ofarim

Apart from having noted the presence of another woman in the charts a couple of months ago, I've never heard of 'em and it's not like the album title is giving me any clues - so who knows what we're getting here, eh?!?

And, having listened to it, I can report that I'm not entirely sure what I got.  There's all sorts in there - starting with the languages alone I noticed Hebrew (I assume it's Hebrew anyway!), French, Italian and English across the album and the songs include Hebrew folk songs, Eurovision fare and Joan Baez-like anthems.  And, then right at the end, it managed to spring the biggest surprise of all because I recognised "Cinderella Rockefella" - it's the "you're the lady, you're the lady" songs.  It's all completely bonkers, but quite enjoyably so - it feels very much of its time but I liked her voice and it was nice that she very much owns the tracks and Abi just gets to warble in the background.  "Girl power!" - 60s style.

We're at #26 in the charts on their thirteenth week of a twenty week run, which feels way more than I'd expect it to have lasted.  The top five this week were Scott, Bob and three best-ofs from The Four Tops, The Supremes and Otis, the highest new entry was Dionne Warwick and, once again, there are no new women in the charts.

Wikipedia doesn't have very much on the album other than telling me that "Cinderella Rockefella" was their biggest single, getting to #1 in the UK and "Morning Of My Life" (wriitten by Robin Gibb) was also pretty successful, getting to #2 in Germany.  And the Germans really went mad for Esther & Abi - this was their third #1 album over there!  I also learned from their entry that, despite being married, neither of their names was actually Ofarim - they started out together in a group called that and I guess it just stuck.

"Customers also listened to" - somewhat surprisingly, it's the third one in a row that I had to rely on YouTube for, so we remain in the dark.  I do, however, suspect that there have never been and never will be too many people out there like Esther and Abi - they're really quite something.  Even if I have to admit I've got no idea what that something actually is...

05/05/68 - A slightly different sound
19/05/68 - An enjoyable album

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