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And that was 1957 - which was not massively different from 1956, but with surprisingly less variety. Once again we started the year with  The King And I  - and boy did we see a lot of that album in this year!  I was somewhat surprised that we only saw fifteen albums in 1956 (but we did only have half of it to consider), but 1957 impressively undertook it with only ten albums in a whole year.  And woah - check out that variety!  Three Elvis Presley, three Frank Sinatra, two Tommy Steele, one Bill Haley and one Nat King Cole - check out the black dude bringing the diversity!  No women though (except for those on TKAI and one more I found hiding in the string quartet on one of Frank's albums).  I did skip over a couple of albums, but given they were compilations from Elvis and Frank, I don't feel that anyone was going to complain too much about that. For the year-end list, we have to go back to bestsellingalbums.org and I'm going to be amazed if TKAI isn'...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 12/05/57 : Rock N' Roll Number 2  - Elvis Presley  Eight weeks skipped over this time - seven of them had TKAI at #1 and Oklahoma! took the other week, so it's fair to say musicals owned the summer of '57.  But, don't worry - Elvis is back for his third appearance of the year (and it would have been four if I could have found his best-of).  And I'm hoping this will be more like the first Elvis album I met quite a few years ago now... Yeah, it is.  It's definitely early Elvis with the instrumentation being very simple - but it's mostly very effective and there are some nice changes in tempo throughout the album.  I liked "Rip It Up", "When My Blue Moon Turns To Gold Again" and "Paralyzed" and most of the rest of it pretty enjoyable but I have to say "Old Shep" really is very rubbish. This week we're at #3 in the charts at the end of a mere three week run with th...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 10/02/57 : Rock The Joint  - Bill Haley And His Comets  Nine weeks skipped over this time, with the time at the top being shared by TKAI (six weeks) and Frank's best-of (three weeks).  Which brings us to a first appearance of the year for Bill, for whom my expectations are not exactly high. Hmmm - it's an interesting one.  It's actually similar to the last offering we saw from him in that he's trying something different from that old rock'n'roll but the variety here is quite interesting.   Some of it sounds very 50s, but some of it sounds surprisingly 70s - yes, I know he wasn't copying the 70s but I really wasn't expecting him to be ahead of his time.  Some of it sounds surprisingly like Status Qu o or  Mud, which quite surprised me.   "The Battle  Of New Orleans" is just weird though - it sounds like something The Goodies would have done.  And let's not start on " Rocking...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 21/04/57 : The Tommy Steele Stage Show  - Tommy Steele  Two weeks skipped over this time and you can probably guess what was #1 for both of them.  I also skipped over a compilation album - shame on me!  Yes, I know I probably shouldn't have but, in my defence, it was a Frank Sinatra compilation and I really think we've had enough of the man this year (and it balances nicely with having skipped over an Elvis compilation earlier in the year).  And what was my reward?  A second Tommy album of the year which I'm really not looking forward to... Hmmm - it's a poorly recorded live show which suggests he was popular (from the screams of the audience) without offering a great deal of evidence as to why.  His voice is odd because he sings with a US accent (generally holding the note, but not always), but in the mid-song chats he's very English indeed (sounding suspiciously like Anton du Beke at times)....

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 14/07/57 : Close To You  - Frank Sinatra  Four weeks skipped this week - two weeks at the top for TKAI and two weeks for Tommy Steele.  And then we're back to Frank - he's had three of the last five albums but  I'm hoping for something better than we had last time . It's actually pretty similar to last time, but everything just seems to be a step up - he sounds a lot more engaged with the tracks on this.   The sound quality is considerably better, which really can't hurt but he just sounds like he's trying.  It also has a load of strings on it, but they don't get tiresome on this album - or maybe I'm just in more of a mood for some strings today.  I can't say any one track particularly stood out but it all glided past quite nicely. We're at #4 in the chart this week on his last week of a nine week run, with it having peaked at #2 in its debut week.  The rest of the top five were  Tom...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 18/08/57 : Love Is The Thing  - Nat King Cole  For a change, no weeks were skipped - and it was a nice coincidence to bump into Nat after having mentioned him in the last post.  I'm not aware I've ever listened to one of his albums, so I'm quite looking forward to it. Hmmm - it's all a bit slow and crooning for me, but when it works well, as it does on "When I Fall In Love", it's a fine thing indeed.  There's nothing wrong with the rest of it, but it's a bit musical wallpapery.  And that's about all I have to say about a musical legend, I'm afraid. We're at #5 in the charts this week on his second run which was a pleasing five weeks, all of which were spent at #5.  His first week was nine weeks, with it managing one week at #1.  The rest of the chart was  TKAI  (back in its rightful place),  Tommy Steele ,  Frank and  Oklahoma! . Wikipedia tells me this is " the first of f...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 25/08/57 : Frankie  - Frank Sinatra  Wow - five albums in and we're already in August.  I've skipped over ten weeks this time - with the #1 spot during this period being held by Elvis (3 weeks) and Frank (7 weeks).  And, so for a bit of variety - here's Frank again!  It's really not been a great year for the women so far - TKAI is the only album to have featured any. I actually couldn't find this album but I did find the tracklist and managed to listen to all the tracks from other albums, so I might not have got exactly the same versions but I reckon I got a feel for them.  And he's definitely not so swingin' on this album - it's mostly swoony and croony with lots of strings and some terrible backing singers.  None of it's terrible, but none of it stands out and it all feels very backward looking - particularly when compared with the offerings we've already experienced from him.  I did know ...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 10/11/57 : The Tommy Steele Story OST  - Tommy Steele  Having to skip over weeks has started early this year - I've had to miss out FOUR of them here and you can probably guess what was #1 for ALL of them!  I've also (somewhat surprisingly) skipped over an album which was a best-of from a little known artist called Elvis Presley -  I would have included it ( even though that would have been three out of for four for the lad) but I couldn't actually find it anywhere (there are a LOT of Elvis best-ofs out there!).  All of which brings us to this album which I'm intrigued by, because, as far as I know, Tommy Steele was a reasonably new singer around this time, so why is he already singing the soundtrack to his own story?  I'm sure Wikipedia will explain it all to me after I've listened to the album. Well, this is an odd one - some of the songs are definitely rock and roll (although definitely "safer" ...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 15/12/57 : A Swingin' Affair!  - Frank Sinatra  Two Elvis albums followed by a Sinatra offering - I suspect this may be the pattern for the year.  I'm expecting this to sound exactly like you'd expect it to... Hmmm - it certainly tries to, but it struggles to reproduce the high quality bar of last year's offering .  The high points are pretty high ("Nice Work If You Can Get It", "You'd Be So Nice To Come Home To", "Look At Me Now" and "The Lady Is A Tramp" being good examples) and the rest isn't in any way bad, but a lot of it sounds a bit similar and lazy - he knew he was on to a good thing and was going to ride it until it dropped.  It's a pretty lazy album cover as well... We're at   #5 in the charts this week on his 16th week of a 17 week run, with it having spent seven consecutive weeks at  #1 earlier in the year.  The rest of the top five were TKAI  (of c...

Continuing my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 22/12/57 : Elvis' Christmas Album  - Elvis Presley  Ah Mr Presley - I haven't see you in ages!  I'm expecting some grade-A Stilton here... Yeah, it's cheesy but it's enjoyable cheese which is kinda what you need for an Xmas album, isn't it?   "Santa Claus Is Back In Town" features some fine boogie-woogie piano, "Blue Christmas" is obviously a classic and  I quite like his version of "O Little Town Of Bethlehem".  The warbly backing singers do get a bit too much at times though and i t is a bit cheeky that the last four tracks are just tracks from an EP he released in April - they're nothing to do with Xmas at all! We're at #2 in the charts this week on his fifth week of a six week run and this was as high as it got - and it's never been back in the charts, which somewhat surprises me.  The rest of the chart was  TKAI  , Elvis ,  Oklahoma !  and Frank - I have a sneak...

Starting my trip back through the 1957 album charts. 29/12/57 : Loving You  - Elvis Presley  I don't mind this era Elvis, but I suspect a full album may prove to be a bit too much. Actually, there's more variety across the album than I was expecting - which is good in some ways but he's already starting with the crooning, which I'm not a big fan of.  It does have "(Let Me Be) Your Teddy Bear" and "Party" on it though, which are fine tracks.  I also like his version of "Blueberry Hill" (but it's no Fats Domino effort) and at 12 tracks in 26 minutes you certainly can't accuse him of hanging around! We're at   #2 in the charts this week on his 19th week of a 24 week run, with it having peaked at   #1 for three weeks.  The rest of the top five were soundtracks from  The King And I   (which was   #1 at the end of 1956 and it's spent 31 weeks at the top in the intervening period, so we're going to be mentioning it a lot!) and ...