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14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Will it change your life? That depends, but hear this once!, December 30, 2004
When both Dion & Phil Spector joined forces in 1975, both personalities had been through the wringer in all senses of the word. Dion had kicked a life-threatening drug addiction that not only resulted in an image change away from his streetwise hipster persona, it also encouraged him to open up his heart more in terms of composing his own material, thus making him a sort of charter member of the burgeoning singer-songwriter movement.
Spector had all but retired from music after his self-proclaimed masterpiece of "River Deep-Mountain High" with Ike & Tina Turner had taken the charts by storm in Europe, but flopped badly in the States. His work with the Beatles (both collectively & individually) had made him a working producer again, but other than that, Spector seemed to want to work on a project-by-project basis, and when Dion hooked up with him for 1975's BORN TO BE WITH YOU, Spector had again dropped out of work.
The resulting album was not the commercial bonanza that was predicted, and critical response was muted at best. In the 3 decades since its release, however, BORN TO BE WITH YOU has gone the way of a lot of Spector's later-period works by becoming a cult classic & one of those albums that those who claim to love it, really & truly adore it. Even Dion had little good to say about the finished product, claiming to be just one small part of Spector's massive wall of sound. Those who only know of BORN TO BE WITH YOU from its impossibly-high legendary status will take care to listen to it at least once in their lives, even if admittedly, it may not be for all tastes.
As it looked, Spector could only muster up enough strength to put his work on 6 of the album's 8 songs, with the other 2 being produced by others, but having Spector conduct the orchestra on them (his most recent work with Starsailor was another such matter, with only 2 songs resulting from the collaboration). Apparently, Spector was rather shaken by the visitation of Bruce Springsteen and Steve Van Zandt to the sessions shortly after Bruce had made the covers of TIME & NEWSWEEK. But those 6 songs are nothing short of breathtaking, and Dion manages to rise above the din to make them his own.
The title track, which had been a hit for the Chordettes in the 1950s, is a 7-minute wall of sound demonstration if anything, literally surrounding the listener with echo and raw musical emotion. For someone who refused to use the most up-to-date recording technology, Spector achieved a real coup in making this song sound like the second coming as much as possible. When the song was edited down by only a minute for a single, radio airplay was perhaps still not in the cards, and honestly, would you want to see a natural wonder like this cut to shreds?
The Spector songs on BORN TO BE WITH YOU had the master producer working with some of the songwriters who had helped him make his legend in the 1960s, and likely this was to make him feel like he was working in the good old days. It worked because even though this was 1975, these songs could easily have been at home in the previous decade. Case in point is my favorite "Make The Woman Love Me". Having been recorded by Cher a little earlier, the team of Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil had created another hearttugging masterpiece just like "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'", and Dion was perhaps THE man to sing it. A lot of people claim that it borders on a stalker's plea, but Dion sings it with such passion & feeling, who would turn him down? He seems to be singing to God for help in winning this woman's love, so this is maybe a secular version of the religious material Dion would record a little later in his career after he had "found God".
After those two magnificent introductory songs, the rest of BORN TO BE WITH YOU was bound to pale in comparison, and it does for the most part. Yet there's no denying that Spector's painstaking attention to detail will help make even the more uninspired material wonders to behold. "Only You Know" & "In & Out Of The Shadows" (both co-written by Spector with Gerry Goffin) are examples of songs which are quite good in the end, but sound a bit anticlimactic after the grandeur of the first two.
Speaking of anticlimaxes, the non-Spector (or non-directly Spector, I should say) material cannot hold a candle to the songs he had a firm hand in creating. "Your Own Backyard" was a song Dion had recorded several years earlier shortly after he took a vow of sobriety, and was one of the most frightening and heartwrenching songs yet recorded. The second time around does not produce the same results, and one can only wonder how it would have sounded had Spector decided to not just simply direct the orchestra...an already scary song could have been the stuff of nightmares! "New York City Song" could also have benefited from something more than Cashman & West's overly-folky approach to production.
"[He's Got] The Whole World In His Hands" comes the closest to meeting those masterpieces with a much more reverent approach to singing God's praises, especially in the vocal arrangement which I hope is what greets me whenever I reach that great record store in the sky. Even this early, it is apparent that Dion's religious reformation was honest & true. It may be a bit too reverent for some listeners, but it is worth their best shot.
The album closes out with "Good Lovin' Man" (which Dion co-wrote with the master himself), which is the most authentic-sounding homage to Dion's early 1960s material, only magnified to the nth power thanks to Spector's Cinemascope production. Whoever does the background vocals, they are not credited on the album, but they give a fabulous vocalist like Dion a run for his money, and the contest ends in a draw with both of them working wonderfully together. The bonus track "Baby, Let's Stick Together" (co-written with Jeff Barry) works the same way, and it is a mystery why this did not make the final album because it would have fit in perfectly.
So maybe BORN TO BE WITH YOU has a slight reputation as a project that sounded exciting on paper, but did not meet expectations (how could it?!) in the end. Just maybe, it was TOO ambitious, and people did not or could not have the patience to endure repeated listens to discover different nuances every time. People like Bobby Gillespie of Primal Scream and Jason Pierce of Spiritualized, who have clearly taken their extreme love of the album to bear in their own music, were probably ones who could, and just maybe they can be proof that BORN TO BE WITH YOU can change your life if you let it. I'm sure Dion's and Phil Spector's opinions of this album have improved in recent years, so if you can allow yourself enough time to take in all that this record has to offer, BORN TO BE WITH YOU just may turn out to be the legend a select & lucky few have deemed it to be.
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
STUNNING DION MASTERPIECE~BRAVO!!!, July 12, 2004
Soulful and magnificant is Dion throughout this classic "Born To Be With You" album giving the most incredible performances of his brilliant career to date!! Loose and soulful on the great opener "Born To Be With You", Dion has always been one of my all time favorite male vocalists and this wonderous song should have been a huge hit but like Tina Turner's "River Deep, Mountain High" radio refused to play it for some strange reason. Anyone who loves great music will go nuts over this masterwork and "Make The Woman Love Me" is a soul-deep and riveting performance that is stunning and completely stirring with Dion at his peak on another classic. Fighting off addictions successfully in "Your Own Back Yard" is revealing while Dion's uniquely original take on the standard "(He's Got)The Whole In His Hands" is hypnotic and mesmerizing. Beautifully flowing like a ride on a carousel is the engaging "Only You Know" and a great New York song which is an appropiate theme coming from Dion is the gorgeous and engrossing "New York City Song". A masterful "In And Out Of The Shadows" is another soulful Dion athem that is really a knock-out and has me using the repeat mode numerous times as is the infectious and ususual "Good Lovin' Man" which is a rhythmic and rocking cooker! Fascinating is the 50's sounding jam "Baby Let's Stick Together" that has a great beat and a hand clapping chorus with great background vocals that are all brilliantly mixed together to great effect making this a grand finale for a true masterpiece!! "Born To Be With You" is such a brilliant and epic work that it is a hard one to follow but "Streetheart" works nicely as it is a pop-soul classic set versus an epic masterpiece. A fine version of Smokey Robinson's "The Way You Do The Things You Do" opens this great set with Dion in loose and top form! Another strong performance makes "Runaway Man" engrossing while "Queen Of '59" is classic Dion in a great setting. Longing and yearning make "If I Can Just Get Through The Night" another stellar performance and it is amazing that radio didn't pick up on this one as it really sounds like a hit. "More To You (Than Meets The Eye)" is a gorgeous and romantic pop song and things quickly heat up and go into high gear with the rhythm rocker "You Showed Me What Love Is" where Dion lets loose and gives another amazing performance that should have been a hit!!! Haunting on the soulful "Hey My Love", Dion is powerful on this great ballad and this too could have been a hit with any airplay at all and brought Dion to the charts in the 70's which should have happened with the quality of this incredible two-album double delight set! Another engaging Dion original "Oh The Night" is a romantic cooker and the musicans throughout this great work are totally inspired including greats such as Ernie Watts, Nino Tempo on a mean sax, Phil Everly on harmony and background vocals!! "I'll Give You All I've Got" is truly great and Dion does exactly that giving his all throughtout this great mix of songs and it is amazing that this was not a blockbuster album during the boring Disco period of the 70's-what a pathetic trade-off and a complete rip-off to Dion and the American public who really lost out missing this masterpiece!!! Wow!!! A hot rocking "Lover Boy Supreme" is another wonderous Dion original and clearly a master at his peak in every way and with airplay this could have gone to #1 in a flash! Closing is classic Dion giving his best on the title "Streetheart" which is another total winner in a totally winning collection. His loose and soulful scatting in this great song is unlike anything I have ever heard from this great singer who is one of my all time favorites!! Bravo Dion!!! You are awesome... DON'T MISS THIS ONE!!!!!!!!
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4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Only we know - how good he is, June 5, 2001
I fell in love with THE VOICE in 1961 and bought everything since - including the gospel stuff. I've just taken delivery of Born To Be With You on CD and found a gem that I'd missed on vinyl. The intro on Only You Know is one of Spector's greatest and then in comes Dion!!!! I've been playing it all night and it makes me feel 14 again. Bloody fantastic!!!!!
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