CD Spotlight -- 11/15/2004

Barbra Streisand -- People (1964)

This is something I want to try to do at least weekly. So get ready for some rather bizarre choices along with some rather reasonable ones as well.

I've been listening to this Streisand CD a lot these days. It's one of the few that my wife can stand and it's truly one of her best moments. Streisand is kind of a weird animal in the fact that she's probably one of the greatest singers to live during a time period where her entire career can be recorded for all time. It's also odd that she's been recording for 40+ years and none of her work has ever gone out of print. Anyway, this is one of my favorite of all the Streisand CDs, and that's saying a lot because there are simply a slew of them.

It's a mixed bag of fast and slow songs--but on the fast songs Babs really gets to let loose and be goofy. Best example is "When In Rome (I Do As The Romans Do)" which is just a hoot to listen to. Barbra even vamps some Italian:

E molto difficile resistere agli uomini di Italia
Per esempio, per esempio i biondi,
I biondi di Firenze, di Venezia
E i bruni di Palermo, di Milano...
You know what I mean?

Actually, Babs, no I don't. But it hardly matters.

The other highlights of the album are the back to back songs "How Does The Wine Taste?" and "I'm All Smiles." I think I summed it up best in my journal way back in 1993 when I first picked up the CD.

But anyway, this song "How Does The Wine Taste?" has these really cool shaker sounds, followed by "I'm All Smiles" with the wicked vibraphone introduction. Vibraphones must be one of the wickedest instruments. The greatest thing about it is that this music is old enough that when you hear the cool shaker sounds or the wicked vibes, you're really getting cool shaker sounds and wicked vibes, and not some computer generated sounds.

Of course there's also "Love Is A Bore" and the most mournful saxophone I've ever heard on the song "Suppertime" (Suppertime/I should set the table 'cause it's/Suppertime.) Anyway, you can probably tell that I really love this CD.