AMAZON. I pay for streaming music. It used to be AMAZON PRIME. Then they had a new program that was a few dollars more. Then . . .
So I pay. I pay for a lot of services. Most are just a waste of time and money. I don't feel that way with AMAZON MUSIC. This weekend, for example, my boyfriend and I were celebrating an anniversary and had some romantic stuff planned.
We both forgot music. So a quick GOOGLE of "romantic music" found Frank Sinatra popping up repeatedly. Not an expert on Frank. I know many of his films -- FROM HERE TO ETERNITY, GUYS AND DOLLS, THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN ARM, OCEAN'S 11, TAKE ME OUT TO THE BALLGAME, OUT ON THE TOWN, THE DETECTIVE, THE MANCHURIAN CANDIDATE, ANCHORS AWAY, SOME CAME RUNNING, TONY ROME, LADY IN CEMENT . . .
But not his singing unless it was in a musical or the album IN THE WEE SMALL HOURS OF THE MORNING.
So we went with Frank and heard some solid albums: CYCLES; SINATRA SINGS DAYS OF WINE AND ROSES, MOON RIVER, AND OTHER ACADEMY AWARD WINNERS (especially "Moon River"); SEPTEMBER OF MY YEARS; and STRANGERS IN THE NIGHT.
Great songs, solid albums and I only know them now because of AMAZON.
I like torch songs -- Sinatra also called them "saloon songs" in one live album we listened to.
A lot of people think they can sing them but they really can't.
Unpopular opinion, I'm sure, but Linda Ronstadt can't sing torch songs. She thinks she can -- or could. Doing three of them in the 80s only exposed how she can have wonderful arrangements but offer very little.
Carly Simon, in 1981 with her TORCH album, really kicked off the modern singers singing torch songs. Carly can do it. I don't care for FILM NOIR -- don't care for the keys the songs are in, don't care for most of the choices. But Carly has delivered with TORCH, INTO WHITE, MOONLIGHT SERENADE and especially MY ROMANCE.
It's on MY ROMANCE that you really grasp how Carly can do what Linda doesn't. Linda goes all over with the notes but her voice never seems full bodied. Carly's voice is full bodied and alive. It delivers.
We weren't impressed with FRANK SINATRA's DUETS album. The 1993 album found Frank recording his part and then other singers recording their parts. Anita Baker, Aretha Franklin, Bono, Tony Bennett, Liza Minnelli, Natalie Cole, Luther Vandross, etc. Great singers and also Bono. But the only track that worked for my boyfriend and I was "Guess I'll Hang My Tears Out To Dry/In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning," the duet he does with Carly. It takes more than pretty notes, you have to believe and Carly clearly believes as she sings.
AMAZON's suggestions? I'm never very keen on them.
For example, after we listened to multiple Frank Sinatra albums, the new suggestion was Joan Baez. How is that related? Why would I want to hear Joan Baez after listening to Frank Sinatra? (Or why would I want to hear Joan Baez period? As an African-American, I recoiled over her appareance on THE LAURA FLANDERS SHOW where she kept referring to African-Americans as "colored" and thought she was cute to do so.)
But if there's someone a friend mentions or that I read about, AMAZON is a place I can go and immediately stream.
