Sinatra. Ol’ Blue Eyes. The Chairman of the Board. It’s hard to know where to start with Frank Sinatra. There’s the young Frank of the 1940’s, the Oscar winning movie star, The Rat Pack years, with his old pals Sammy Davis, Dean Martin and the boys. Then there’s the manic depression, the equal rights activist and the alleged links to the Mafia. Not forgetting the broads. Ah yes, all the beautiful broads.
The Frank Sinatra I picture in my head is in his mid 40s and up. Always wearing a tux. On stage, microphone in hand, maybe a tumbler of whiskey resting on the grand piano, and ideally a 25 piece big band orchestra behind him. In Vegas, of course. The old Vegas, before “the big corporations took it all over, when the dealers knew your name, what you drank, what you played. Today, it’s like checkin’ into an airport”, as Ace Rothstein ranted at the end of the movie Casino.
Sinatra and Las Vegas go together like whiskey and water. When he died in ’98, the city honoured him by dimming the lights on the strip. This new compilation, Sinatra – Best of Vegas, has 17 tracks recorded at the Sands, Caesars Palace, and the Golden Nugget between ‘61 and ‘87.
The first group of tracks was recorded at the Sands during November of 1961. This is Sinatra in his mid 40s at the height of his powers, cocky and self-assured, throwing little chirps in between lyrics and clowning around a little. But this doesn’t detract from the genius of his vocal delivery and song interpretation. Moonlight in Vermont is a smoky introspective number, hypnotic in its subtleties and orchestral arrangement. The crowd is spellbound. In the middle of singing, “Evening summer breeze…” Franks suddenly says “God damn boy I tell ya!” The crowd laughs, before being put straight back under as Frank immediately returns to his vocal master class. He’s basically toying with them. Later, at the beginning of The Lady is a Tramp, he’s obviously taking a sip of his drink: “Jack Daniels.” [a ripple of laughter]. “That’s what it is”.
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The sound of the big band adds a whole new dimension. As a singer it must be like being strapped to the nose of a nuclear warhead. “She gets much too hungry to wait for dinner at eight,” Ba-da-ba-da-BAM! I love the way the orchestra simmers in the background then suddenly explodes into a tower of sound. Later, in I’ve Got You Under My Skin, Frank says, “We’re gonna take this here building and move it three feet that way… Hold on to your handbags!” It honestly feels like it’s possible.
In a way, it’s easy to appreciate Sinatra. He defines cool. But I guess what really makes him win you over, is that behind all the bravado and clowning around, he occasionally lets on that he’s just another “broken hearted bum on a losing streak”. It’s kind of endearing from a guy who seemingly has everything. Before singing Angel Eyes, he says, “They’re all about a guy who’s losing, these saloon songs… In this case, this is about a guy whose been left behind by his chick whose left town… she got a peak at the guy’s wallet and they both left”. The following vocal delivery has more emotion in it than the entire Emo music genre.
Many years ago, as a young aspiring musician, I went and played a couple of songs for a local music producer. I was pretty confident that my songs were going to blow this guy away. When I stopped playing he told me I should go and listen to some of the greats. For pure singing, he suggested Sinatra. He made the point that when you try to sing along to a Sinatra song, you always find that you’re singing lines too early or too late or holding notes for too long. You have an idea in your head of how the song goes, but it never actually goes like that. There are other stories, like the one musician who was convinced that Frank was singing out of tune in the studio one day, but then when listening to the playback it sounded perfect.
As a singer, Sinatra was operating in a different league, hearing things that only he hears yet we all somehow appreciate. On the side he was also a good actor and held his own as a standup comedian, all of which you get a taste of in this superb live album. If you consider yourself to be a reasonably well-informed person, this collection of classic performances is obligatory. And if you’re a seasoned aficionado, it’s an essential addition to your collection. If you don’t fit into either of these categories, then you’re simply not to be trusted.
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