Customer Reviews

Faust

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

The original release of "Faust" (in Randy's words) "didn't sell enough to pay for my kids' toothpaste."

The Randster tackles the classic story, "Faust" with sardonic tongue-in-cheek style that laces through most of his best work, and comes out with a fantastic and subtely (and sometimes out-loud) funny work of art. Great tunes, fantastic production - this album in certain ways culminates a unique and beatufiul career - Randy tackles the heaviest of subjects (God), drags out contemporaries and far more commercially successful friends (Elton John, Don Henley) and creates a work of beauty that is so direct AND off center, that it finds little audience in today's CD buying market place. For those who love "Good Old Boys" - this is a perfect companion. Tackling an even more taboo subject with another disc of Randy on piano, playing the melodies raw.

Randy, of course, plays The Devil. And his own personally undecided view of religion comes through. How Glorious is God sings James Taylor as The Big Guy, only to have Randy reply with "We're Only a Figment of Their Imagination." Are they? And if so, whose singing? Ah, the irony. Randy style.

Kick in Disc 1 and listen to this masterpiece in lushly produced glory, and now listen to Randy's demos on Disc 2 as he warbles his way through the story - double confirming that the Great Mystery is just as confusing to Mr. Newman as it is for the rest of us.

But most importantly, as any good album, it comes down to the music. If you'd like a concept album that breaks new ground while singing about the old, this is for you. Take a chance. You'll never hear anything like it. God Bless Randy for being Randy and taking chances. Or someone should bless him - whoever you personally believe has the ability to do it.

Clever, blasphemous, corrosively funny and sometimes poignant. It's the real thing. Let's face it: putting this in front of a pop music audience was like feeding oysters and icy vodka to a baby. No wonder it failed commercially. But it bears repeated listening, in my experience. Knowing Goethe's Faust (Part I) helps. The orchestration is creative, the melodies occasionally lovely. I only wish that it had been fully developed instead of staying in its unfinished form, because it would have ranked among the best of American musical theater. The remaining tracks are fragments of a brilliant work.

I listened to this album (with headphones) for the first time last night and when I wasn't laughing, my jaw was on the floor for the sheer musical greatness that unfolded before me. You gotta hear this with headphones. Christians beware, Randy Newman is on the prowl! But in all fairness to Randy, he says in his liner notes (also great w/ this Dlx pkg) "It doesn't make the case for Atheism more effectively than than the case for religion". If you doubted Newman's artistry before, then Faust will surely correct your oversight!

Do we really need another version of Randy Newman's Faust? I hardly listened to it when it first came out, though it has grown on me since the last Rhino reissues. As a Randy Newman fan I would rather skip a track with a James Taylor lead vocal on it, than have to listen to it. That goes double for a Bonnie Raitt or Linda Ronstadt one. And since I have made it through all of those Soundtrack albums, AND all those cast sung songs, I guess I can make it through Faust. I'd love to say that Faust is mostly Randy but it's not, but as you probably are aware it's still great songs, great musicians, (Including Ry Cooder & Jim Keltner) and it sounds like a Randy Newman album. But now with this new reissue it really doesn't matter because the second disc is over an hour of Randy on piano. It also comes with nice packaging, expanded booklet with an interesting essay, and did I mention a complete disc of Randy Newman. It is similar to the Bonus disc of "Good Old Boys", and we couldn't of asked for anything better than that.
So is Faust worth 5 stars? Is it better than "Sail Away", "Little Criminals", "Good Old Boys" get real. It's still, for a collection of songs originally released in 1995, pretty good.
So if your not a Randy Newman fan start with "Trouble in Paradise" and work your way down. Everybody else sell your old copy of Faust on ebay and get 2 discs for the price of one.

I am a big Randy Neuman fan, but did not like this CD. The one song I bought it for was sung by someone else, not Randy, and 99% of the songs on it were biblical, like for a church service, and others were from the stage.