![]() In the event, they did record it - perhaps because they could play Born To Run in return - and their version is quite lovely, if a bit wedding-bandish. ![]() ![]() When Frankie Goes To Hollywood singer Holly Johnson in the mid-’80s wanted to record a version of (Do You Know The Way To) San José, his laddish colleagues vociferously opposed the idea. Luther Vandross also was an outstanding interpreter of Bacharach, as he shows here on the slooowed down version of Anyone Who Had A Heart.īut outside soul and a few pop visionaries, Bacharach was considered uncool for a long time. Lyn Collins in her 1974 recording (featured here in the superior single version) proves further that many Bacharach songs are really soul songs, as do Aretha Franklin and Isaac Hayes, who had a way of transforming Bacharach songs into acid trips, though the present live version of The Look Of Love is a straight take on the song. Soul singer Lou Johnson recorded several Bacharach/David songs before they became hits, though Kentucky Bluebird (later a Warwick hit as Message To Michael) was recorded by fellow soulster Jerry Butler a year earlier. But it wasn’t: many Bacharach songs are best heard as soul songs, as the Covered With Soul Bacharach/David mix proved. The triumvirate fell apart in the early 1970s amid a flurry of lawsuits.īy the 1970s the Bacharach style became unfashionable, incongruously labelled as easy listening fare. Some of these Warwick would be the first to record, others would be given to other artists first, to be covered later by Warwick (who had 22 US Top 40 hits with Bacharach/David songs). And so many songs came to be written with Dionne in mind. Warwick’s interpretations, however, were usually quite perfect. Warwick’s initial task was to sing on the demo recordings of songs destined for others. The breakthrough arguably was meeting Dionne Warwick in 1961, who would become something of a muse for the songwriters. Over the next few years they scored a series of minor hits, many of which featured on the Bacharach: The Lesser Known Songbook mix. The pair scored their first major hit soon after taking over a cubicle in the Brill Building in 1957: Perry Como’s Magic Moments. And consider some of these Brill alumni: Goffin & King, Mann & Weil, Leiber & Stoller, Sedaka & Greenfield, Barry & Greenwich, Neil Diamond, Laura Nyro. Still, a few words seem necessary.īacharach and lyricist Hal David probably were the most prolific Brill Building partnership if others exceeded their output, then certainly not with as much success. That, to me, is the equivalent of coffee being declared socially unacceptable. ![]() His popularity as a songwriter grew, and over 1,000 artists have recorded his songs over the years.It is probably redundant to deliberate at length about Burt Bacharach’s massive influence, other than to point out how incongruous it is that there were times when it was seen as somehow uncool to dig Bacharach’s music. Thomas reached number 1 on the charts.īurt Bacharach won an Oscar for Best Original Song and Best Original Score. The tune was written by Burt Bacharach with the help of Hal David for the 1969 film ‘Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.’ The single released by B.J. After they hold out the final note, Burt pats Tom’s leg. Burt and Tom tap their feet, rock in their chairs, and share smiles. The two men join in the chorus and sing a beautiful harmony together. The songwriter sings his own words while Tom looks on smiling. They keep falling.”Īnother empty rocking chair is next to Tom, and after verse 1, Burt Bacharach shows up and sits down. He’s joined by Big Jim Sullivan on acoustic guitar as he starts the song, singing, “Raindrops are falling on my head, and just like the guy whose feet are too big for his bed. Sir Tom Jones sits on a rocking chair with a western backdrop.
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