Tony Bennett - Playin' With My Friends: Bennett Sings The Blues

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s

Time: 57:05

Size: 130.7 MB

Styles: Vocal

Year: 2001

Art: Front

[3:28] 1. Alright, Okay, You Win (With Diana Krall)

[3:35] 2. Everyday (I Have The Blues) (With Stevie Wonder)

[2:41] 3. Don't Cry Baby

[4:53] 4. Good Morning Heartache (With Sheryl Crow)

[3:14] 5. Let The Good Times Roll (With B.B. King)

[4:12] 6. Evenin' (With Ray Charles)

[3:52] 7. I Gotta Right To Sing The Blues (With Bonnie Raitt)

[3:49] 8. Keep The Faith, Baby (With K.D. Lang)

[3:23] 9. Old Count Basie Is Gone (Old Piney Brown Is Gone)

[3:19] 10. Blue And Sentimental (With Kay Starr)

[4:29] 11. New York State Of Mind (With Billy Joel)

[3:15] 12. Undecided Blues

[3:32] 13. Blues In The Night

[4:32] 14. Stormy Weather (With Natalie Cole)

[4:45] 15. Playin' With My Friends (With Others)

Tony Bennett's latter-day albums tend to have themes, and this one has two, as indicated by its double-barreled title: It is both a duets album and a blues album. The duet partners include ten singers who range from his recent touring partners Diana Krall and k.d. lang to fellow veterans Ray Charles, B.B. King, and Kay Starr, and younger, but still mature pop stars Stevie Wonder, Bonnie Raitt, and Billy Joel. All sound happy to be sharing a mic with Bennett. Not surprisingly, the singer's conception of the blues does not extend to the Mississippi Delta or the South Side of Chicago; rather, he is interested in the blues as filtered through the sound of the Swing Era, particularly from around Kansas City, and as interpreted by Tin Pan Alley and show tunes. For the former, his true mentor is Count Basie, whose overt influence is heard on six of the 15 tracks. Bennett makes no attempt to hide this, leading off the album with two songs, "Alright, Okay, You Win" (a duet with Krall) and "Everyday (I Have the Blues)" (a duet with Wonder), closely associated with Basie singer Joe Williams. The Broadway and Hollywood blues style is introduced in three selections written by Harold Arlen. On about half the tracks, the Ralph Sharon Quartet is augmented by Harry Allen's saxophone and Mike Melvoin's Hammond organ, but this remains a small, intimate affair that emphasizes the singers. There are missteps -- Sheryl Crow's Billie Holiday impersonation on "Good Morning, Heartache" is unfortunate, and Natalie Cole, as usual, sounds out of her depth on "Stormy Weather." But the trade-offs Bennett enjoys with King and Charles are priceless, and the Joel duet is surprisingly effective. On the whole, this is yet another entry in Bennett's lengthening series of autumnal recorded triumphs. ~William Ruhlmann

Playin' with My Friends"

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Tony Bennett & k.d. lang - A Wonderful World

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 43:22
Size: 99.3 MB
Styles: Vocal
Year: 2002
Art: Front

[3:15] 1. Exactly Like You
[3:22] 2. La Vie En Rose
[4:42] 3. I'm Confessin' (That I Love You)
[2:56] 4. You Can Depend On Me
[3:19] 5. What A Wonderful World
[3:03] 6. That's My Home
[3:23] 7. A Kiss To Build A Dream On
[3:47] 8. I Wonder
[3:53] 9. Dream A Little Dream Of Me
[3:11] 10. You Can't Lose A Broken Heart
[4:36] 11. That Lucky Old Sun (Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day)
[3:50] 12. If We Never Meet Again

Tony Bennett has sung with k.d. lang previously, notably on his MTV Unplugged album, and the two have meshed well together, largely because of lang's willingness to sublimate herself to Bennett's approach. The same thing can be said of the two on this full-length duet album (which also contains solos -- Bennett is heard alone on "That's My Dream," lang on "A Kiss to Build a Dream On" and "That Lucky Old Sun [Just Rolls Around Heaven All Day]"). It isn't just that lang joins in on material more suitable to Bennett's style than to hers. This is an album on which the musicians are the members of Bennett's backup group (plus strings), recorded in Bennett's studio. But one never gets the sense that lang is restricted by the approach. She is sufficiently versatile, or chameleon-like, to sound like she's enjoying herself, just as she did earlier in her career when she was working with producer Owen Bradley in Nashville and singing traditional country. At 76, Bennett sings with an easy, casual style, never seeming to work very hard for his effects, and lang, in her vocal prime, deliberately complements him, though she never seems quite as comfortable. Although there is no indication other than an uncredited painting (by Bennett, of course) inside the CD booklet, this is a tribute album to Louis Armstrong, who recorded these songs over the course of his long career. That doesn't mean that there's a trumpet to be heard anywhere on the disc or that either of the singers tries to re-create any aspect of Armstrong's vocal style. It simply provides an organizing principle that the listener can notice or not. (Well, it's hard not to notice during the title song, with Bennett's references to "Satchmo" and "Pops.") Like Armstrong, Bennett and lang are trying to make the music sound effortless and unstudied, and to a large extent they succeed. ~William Ruhlmann

A Wonderful World

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Various - A Tribute To Joni Mitchell

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s

Time: 53:10

Size: 121.7 MB

Styles: Folk rock, Singer-songwriter

Year: 2007

Art: Front

[4:59] 1. Sufjan Stevens - Free Man In Paris

[5:05] 2. Björk - The Boho Dance

[4:56] 3. Caetano Veloso - Dreamland

[5:08] 4. Brad Mehldau - Don't Interrupt The Sorrow

[5:58] 5. Cassandra Wilson - For The Roses

[3:30] 6. Prince - A Case Of You

[2:46] 7. Sarah Mclachlan - Blue

[3:38] 8. Annie Lennox - Ladies Of The Canyon

[3:40] 9. Emmylou Harris - The Magdalene Laundries

[5:56] 10. Elvis Costello - Edith And The Kingpin

[3:58] 11. K.D. Lang - Help Me

[3:32] 12. James Taylor - River

Joni Mitchell covers dot the musical landscape the way Tim Hortons doughnut shacks line the highways of Ontario. It's a little surprising, then, that the first Mitchell tribute album to be released on a major U.S. label didn't emerge until 2007, which was coincidentally the same year Mitchell was scheduled to release Shine, her first studio effort to appear in some ten years. And as far as tribute albums go, A Tribute to Joni Mitchell isn't half bad. The compilation is split up between songs that were recorded specifically for the tribute album, such as Sufjan Stevens' "A Free Man in Paris," and those that were recorded and released previously, such as James Taylor's "River." The tracks that were recorded specifically for A Tribute are far and away the best. Stevens approaches "A Free Man in Paris" with his characteristic, and fitting, over-the-top irony and band geek sensibilities. Opening with a brass fanfare, the kind that wouldn't be out of place in the opening credits of a network news show, Stevens' cover tackles the original with an appropriate sense of theatricality and fun. Björk's lilting cover of "Boho Dance," lush with synthesized bells and whorls, arguably rivals the original. She does a very good job of allowing Mitchell's lyics to unfurl, even while she twists and transforms the song, fairy godmother-style, into something otherworldly. And Caetano Veloso's rendition of "Dreamland" is simply a revelation. It's not a huge stretch from the original, but Veloso's light, gentle vocals, augmented by the the warm, loose Brazilian instrumentation, somehow manages to grab Mitchell's narrative and bring it to life. Mitchell is a storyteller, and the best tracks on here are those that welcome and explore her narratives. The worst ignore or misinterpret them. Prince pays little attention to Mitchell's lyrics on "A Case of You," slashing the first two verses in order to cut right to the chase. This abridged version has a lot of soul, but it does little to pay tribute to Mitchell's original; Prince cut out the pathos and made the song sappy. To be fair, Mitchell's a difficult person to pay tribute to, let alone cover, seeing how she's one of those rare singer/songwriters whose abilities as a performer are equal to her compositions. This stands in stark contrast to someone like Bob Dylan, whose songs were often just as, if not more, enjoyable in their Jimi Hendrix or Joan Baez incarnations. But while she's ultimately the best performer of her own work, Mitchell, with her warbly soprano and idiosyncratic sense of composition, hasn't always lent herself to the unaccustomed ear. A Tribute to Joni Mitchell is thus a great listen for those who'd like to ease into the breadth and range of Mitchell's work by way of established, accessible artists like Prince, Sarah McLachlan and Taylor. Granted, fans will probably find themselves yearning for the original material after listening to this disc, but this is only another way in which A Tribute succeeds. These interpretations, imperfect as they can be, provide new vantage points from which Mitchell's original albums can be located, analyzed, and appreciated. ~Margaret Reges

A Tribute To Joni Mitchell

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Various - Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil: Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 57:33
Size: 131.8 MB
Styles: Soundtrack
Year: 1997
Art: Front

[3:46] 1. K.D. Lang - Skylark
[3:38] 2. Joe Williams - Too Marvelous For Words
[5:06] 3. Paula Cole - Autumn Leaves
[4:07] 4. Rosemary Clooney - Fools Rush In [where Angles Fear To Tread]
[5:07] 5. Brad Mehldau - Dream
[4:44] 6. Cassandra Wilson - Days Of Wine And Roses
[3:28] 7. Kevin Spacey - That Old Black Magic
[4:28] 8. Alison Eastwood - Come Rain Or Come Shine
[3:33] 9. Clint Eastwood - Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive
[3:42] 10. Alison Krauss - This Time The Dream's On Me
[4:46] 11. Kevin Mahogany - Laura
[3:56] 12. Diana Krall - Midnight Sun
[4:57] 13. Joshua Redman - I'm An Old Cowhand [from The Rio Grande]
[2:09] 14. Tony Bennett - I Wanna Be Around

This Clint Eastwood vanity-project was one of the biggest box office disappointments of 1997, despite a masterful performance by Kevin Spacey, Eastwood's typically subtle direction and, to these ears anyway, one of the most satisfying collections of songs gathered in service of a film in many a year. It didn't hurt that they were all penned by the late, great Johnny Mercer (a native of Savannah, GA, the film's locale and most crucial, underrated element) and with the exception of Tony Bennett's "I Wanna Be Around" and Sinatra's classic "Summer Wind," were rendered by an all-star team of jazz players (Charlie Haden, Michael Brecker, Joshua Redman, Kevin Eubanks, Christian McBride among them) and an impressive line-up of vocalists including k.d. lang, Paula Cole, Joe Williams, Rosemary Clooney, Cassandra Wilson, Alison Krauss, Diana Krall, and Kevin Mahogany. Eastwood has long been a jazz devotee and, in recent years, eager proselytizer; this album plays like a love letter to one of his most beloved musicians and composers. --Jerry McCulley

Midnight In The Garden Of Good And Evil: Music From And Inspired By The Motion Picture

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k.d. Lang - Live By Request

Bitrate: 320K/s
Time: 53:25
Size: 122.3 MB
Styles: Pop/rock, Country
Year: 2001
Art: Front

[4:03] 1. Summerfling
[2:56] 2. Big Boned Gal
[3:44] 3. Black Coffee
[3:19] 4. Trail Of Broken Hearts
[4:32] 5. Crying
[3:44] 6. Don't Smoke In Bed
[3:55] 7. The Consequences Of Falling
[3:25] 8. Miss Chatelaine
[2:53] 9. Three Cigarettes In An Ashtray
[4:20] 10. Barefoot
[4:32] 11. Constant Craving
[3:50] 12. Wash Me Clean
[4:41] 13. Pullin' Back The Reins
[3:26] 14. Simple

Live by Request is a series of occasional television specials broadcast on the A&E cable network, conceived by Tony Bennett's son and manager Danny Bennett. It works well for musical artists with loyal followings and established catalogs who may no longer be at the forefront of the record industry but are anxious to promote new albums. Viewers and fellow celebrities call in carefully screened requests that allow the performers to revisit their old favorites and mix in some new ones. k.d. lang was a good choice for such a show, and here she becomes the first artist to use the Live by Request rubric for a corresponding album. lang usually makes concept albums with distinctive themes that can be quite different from each other stylistically and, of course, she moved toward an adult contemporary pop sound after beginning her career as a country singer, so her discography sometimes seems to be all over the map. By mixing songs from her different albums here, she is able to demonstrate the similarities in them, suggesting that the apparent diversity in her music is not as extreme as it might have seemed. Also, never having released a compilation, she compresses her catalog into an excellent introduction here. All that's missing is another important aspect of the Live by Request shows -- the spontaneous personal interaction they tend to provide between artist and audience. lang just goes from one song to another on the disc, never saying anything more elaborate than "Thank you so much" in between. No requests from fans are heard, no comments by the singer. In that sense, the album is just a straightforward (and somewhat cut and dried) live album, with none of the special flavor of the TV show. ~William Ruhlmann

Live By Request

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Lyle Lovett - Release Me

Bitrate: 320K/s
Time: 51:40
Size: 118.3 MB
Styles: Country
Year: 2012
Art: Front

[3:05] 1. Garfield's Blackberry Blossom
[2:45] 2. Release Me
[3:31] 3. White Boy Lost In The Blues
[3:16] 4. Baby, It's Cold Outside
[4:48] 5. Isn't That So
[3:41] 6. Understand You
[3:35] 7. Brown Eyed Handsome Man
[2:35] 8. Keep It Clean
[2:58] 9. One Way Gal
[6:10] 10. Dress Of Laces
[3:56] 11. The Girl With The Holiday Smile
[3:25] 12. Night's Lullaby
[5:05] 13. White Freightliner Blues
[2:44] 14. Keep Us Steadfast

Lovett says he wanted "Release Me" to be "a punctuation mark for this whole part of my career." The album is comprised primarily of covers, "some songs that have been important to me and have been an important part of my career. Several of these songs I've played since 1976 and just had never recorded." Among them are tunes by Jesse Winchester, Townes Van Zandt, Michael Franks, Frank Loesser and Chuck Berry, as well as the traditional instrumental "Garfield's Blackberry Bottom."

Lovett contributed two originals to the set: "The Girl With the Holiday Smile" came from a real-life 1978 encounter at a Houston 7-11 "where I met this young lady hiding out from the cops" and also appeared on his 2011 holiday EP "Songs For the Season;" and he composed "Night's Lullaby," which features Nickel Creek's Sara and Sean Watkins, for a 2011 run in the Shakespeare Center Los Angeles' production of "Much Ado About Nothing" that the three appeared in. Lovett co-produced the album with Nathaniel Kunkel, and other guests include k.d. lang and Kat Edmonson.

Release Me

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k.d. lang - Watershed

Bitrate: 320K/s
Time: 38:54
Size: 89.1 MB
Styles: Contemporary country
Year: 2008
Art: Front

[4:00] 1. I Dream Of Spring
[2:51] 2. Je Fais La Planche
[3:26] 3. Coming Home
[3:27] 4. Once In A While
[3:38] 5. Thread
[4:26] 6. Close Your Eyes
[4:17] 7. Sunday
[3:30] 8. Flame Of The Uninspired
[3:37] 9. Upstream
[3:07] 10. Shadow And The Frame
[2:30] 11. Jealous Dog

WATERSHED is the first album K.D. Lang has ever produced by herself, and as such, it sounds like a culmination of nearly every sound the Canadian singer-songwriter has ever explored in her career, save the manic rockabilly cowpunk of her debut album, 1987's ANGEL WITH A LARIAT. The lush, torchy feel of 1992's INGENUE and the jazzier direction of her later albums are the most obvious touchstones for the warmth and intimacy of WATERSHED, with the wistful opener "I Dream of Spring" and the cocktail lounge balladry of "Sunday" the most obvious standouts in that category. Elsewhere, the country-tinged sway of the harmony-heavy "Flame of the Uninspired" and the semi-rustic banjo-led folk of "Jealous Dog" recall the sound of SHADOWLAND and ABSOLUTE TORCH AND TWANG, while the gentle Brazilian pulse of "Upstream" and the minimalist electronics of "Shadow and the Frame" point towards new areas of exploration. One of Lang's finest and most self-assured records, WATERSHED is an essential listen.

Recording information: Art Kitchen; Glenwood Studios; Jungle Room; The Hut.

k.d. lang (vocals, guitar, banjo, harp, piano, keyboards, percussion, drum programming); Ben Mink (guitar, acoustic guitar); Greg Leisz (guitar, electric guitar, steel guitar); Teddy Borowiecki (guitar, piano, organ, keyboards, vibraphone, programming, drum programming); David Piltch (guitar, acoustic bass, electric bass, drums, percussion, programming, drum programming); Grecco Buratto, Bryan Sutton (guitar); Noam Pikelny (banjo); Jon Hassell (trumpet); Danny Frankel (drums, percussion); Lynne Earls (programming, drum programming).

Watershed

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