The Smiley Smile Message Board

i just bought his greatest hits, what's everyone think of him?

"Sail Away" is one of Brian´s favourite albums.

I like what I've got of his. I saw him on Conan once and Conan was all pumped about Good Old Boys, so I bought it. I also have his first album and Little Criminals on LP (so I never listen to them), and I got Sail Away because of the Holland story about Brian. I like his style and I guess I understand his sense of humour, as far as I know.

Great songwriter. At his best when you're not certain if he's joking or not. In my opinion, he's also a very underrated singer, I hear lots of bluesy emotion in his voice. In some ways, this rather understated delivery can be a tremendous advantage, like in You Can Leave Your Hat On -  a song which makes me want to vomit when Joe Cocker and Tom Jones do it.

Another Randy Newman album I really like is Nilsson Sings Newman. This joint effort with Harry Nilsson singing is fab stuff, I especially like Cowboy.

For writing on Randy, check out Greil Marcus' fab essay on him in his book "Mystery Train"!

One of Randy's nicest songs is Snow on the Harpers Bizarre "Anything Goes" cd. It is arranged by Van Dyke's mentor, Bob Thompson, and sounds brilliant. Of course, Song Cycle has a couple of Randy Newman tunes as well.

I always wondered if you couldn't see his first record from 1968 as a companion piece to "Song Cycle" and "Smile". It was coproduced by Van Dyke and it also sounds like it was made up of fragments, plus there is a lot of changes in dynamics with quiet passages followed by very loud ones. In that respect a song like "Love Story" reminds a little of "Cabinessence" or "Wind Chimes", the outro to "So Long Dad" reminds a little of the outro to H&V and so forth, I wonder if it was something Van Dyke brought with him from working on "Smile". Anyway it's probably the best or at least on par with the two other albums.

Søren

i will have to give his first album another listen , i was a little underwhelmed by it .maybe it's the sound of the cd ? it seems it needs the remastered treatment .

12 Songs is his finest effort, but the first 5 are all stellar.

Ever heard Joe Cocker do Guilty? Knocks it out of the ballpark, even though Newman's version is far superior.

I think they had that when I bought the first album (it was at a record convention) and I forgot to get it. Like, I saw the first album, bought it, but didn't bother remembering that 12 Songs is supposedly better. I should've picked them both up.

Absolutely.

That's right. I'm big on "Trouble In Paradise," too.

Hmm, I don't think he's been able to sustain an entire album since Good Old Boys.
There's great stuff on Born Again, Land Of Dreams and the last one.
Paradise and Criminals are my least favorites.

"its a story about friendship and music by me,
sbout a bear and a bunny and the bear becomes the bunny's new family,
...somethin like that"

Sail Away is great.  I want to check out Good Old Boys but havent gotten to it yet. 

It's a matter of taste. I prefer the first one to 12 Songs, probably because of the wilder arrangements.

Love Randy Newman.  And I dare say that there is some good Randy stuff many haven't heard.

Anybody heard the Faust recording?

I also really like his Randy Newman Songbook Vol 1 (presumably more are to follow) recent album where its just Randy and Piano on some of his better known songs.

The ragtime soundtrack music is, in a word, beautiful.