Customer Reviews

The Best Of Big Daddy

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I was the lead guitarist with Big Daddy for five years (that's me singing "Dancin' in the Dark," "Whip It," and "Super Freak"). I'm not reviewing the album to up the star rating (it seems I don't need to!), but rather to enlist the help of those who enjoy our music.

Not including this compilation, Big Daddy has four albums out. Unfortunately though, the first two ("Whatever Happened to the Band of '59?" and "Meanwhile...Back in the States") have never been available on CD. Though those two are amply represented on this collection, lots of great stuff had to be left off. I may be biased--I left the band just before "Cutting Their Own Groove" was recorded--but I think those first two LP's were the band's best work.

Perhaps if enough people clamored for them, Rhino might eventually release the first two albums on CD. I know I'd love to have a CD of Big Daddy's versions of "Billie Jean," "All Night Long," "Hotel California" and the "Theme From Star Wars." My turntable is broken, and my old cassettes of the albums don't sound so great anymore. So let's make some noise!

The idea behind Big Daddy is taht they take recent songs and play them as though they were from the '50s. For instance, "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" is sung with its original melody and harmony, but it's been arranged so it sounds like "Duke of Earl".

This album has selections from all four of Big Daddy's tragically-out-of-print albums, including the brilliant "Sgt. Pepper", where they remade every song on the Beatles' "Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". "A Day in the Life" is done as Buddy Holly would have sung it, and it's mighty fine. There's also a new version of "My Heart Will Go On" with, it says here, "Sound Effects courtesy of Rhino Records 'SON OF SCARY SOUNDS'." Yikes!

All of the songs sound great, and in some cases (I'm thinking particularly about "Super Freak" and "Eye of the Tiger") are actually improved by the new versions.

And it's important to keep this in mind: it's hilarious!

The first time that I had ever heard a Big Daddy tune was on Rhino Records 15th anniversary cd. The two tracks were Super Freak and Dancin' In the Dark. Wow!! I thought I had died and gone to parody heaven. Since then, I've purchased Cutting Their Own Groove and their Sgt. Pepper's tribute. These guys are totally awesome. When is Rhino going to reissue Big Daddy's first two releases and what about any live tracks that may be floating around???? All I can say is please Misters Bronson and Foos give us more Big Daddy.

When I was a teenager in the eighties I heard about Big Daddy on BBC Radio 1. Apparently they were imprisoned by Communist guerillas in Laos in the 50s and not released until the mid-80s. When they were released they were given sheet music of modern songs and recorded them in their own inimitable style. On reading the sleeve notes I discover this to have been a hoax.Well done Marty Kaniger, and shame on you! I fell for the whole thing and told my husband about it 20 years later and bought the album. Twenty years on it sounds just as entertaining and innovative, and I shall tell my friends all about it. We particularly like the totally irreverent take on Prince's "Little Red Corvette" I highly recommend this album

OK. I don't have this CD, but I have Big Daddy's _Sgt. Pepper_ and _Cutting Their Own Groove_, whence come some of the tracks on this CD (which I'll be ordering as soon as I'm done here!). If you've never heard of Big Daddy...their "origin story" is that they are a 50's band that were lost for a decade or so while on a triumphant world tour...and when they were rescued, they found that the music world had changed. There were some great lyrics being written, but the tunes--well, Big Daddy fixes that by setting the lyrics in the style they know and love.

These folks are fine musicians, and their love for 50's hits shines through. The settings are ingenious--"Money for Nothing" is set in the style of Tennessee Ernie Ford's famous earlier working man's lament, and "A Day in the Life" takes on a whole new life Buddy Holly style (be sure to listen to all of it). I just wish this had been a double CD, because there's so much best to Big Daddy. (The beat poetry version of "Within You Without You" from their _Sgt. Pepper_ or the twisted "Welcome to the Jungle" meets "Wimoweh" leap to mind.) Buy this disc! You'll laugh at their audacity, smile to hear current hits a new way, and you'll hear some darned good music.

In a somewhere-during-the-eighties interview with Mick Jagger, he expressed the all-too-correct opinion that "I'm afraid there is no future to rock and roll: it's only recycled past." He's right. Rock and roll died about the time that it ceased to be 'rock and roll' and became simply 'rock.' Hence crap like 'alternative,' (c)rap, wanky little transvestities wielding synthesizers, and (ulp) 'adult contemporary.' Big Daddy has always acknowledged this grim fact, and they have chosen to manifest this by claiming that "they were a USO band kidnapped by the Vietcong in the '50s, and, upon their release in the '80s, the only way they knew how to play music was '50s style." Oh, baby: these cats are BRILLIANT. They take Stringbean's "Dancing In The Dark" and present it like Pat Boone would have performed it. Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" comes out sounding like "Duke of Earl," i.e, "Do-do-do-do-dah gurls just wanna have fun." Even the sainted Beatles aren't spared: "When I'm 64" becomes "Sixty Minute Man." My only regret is that Rhino didn't include their version of Michael's "Billie Jean," which they performed like "Be Bop A Lula" with a Booker T instrumental break. The guys are brilliant. Buy this CD, folks, and I guarantee you'll understand why Elvis impersonaters do such a thriving business.