Customer Reviews

Oldies But Goodies 15

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Oldies But Goodies, Vol. 15 caps off this fifteen CD series with fifteen wonderful hits from way back when! Listening to these great songs brought back memories of me of my junior high school dances and dating later on. The quality of the sound is excellent; and the artwork is nicely done. This is anything but elevator music!

Joe Hinton starts things off with a remarkably pretty tune, "Funny How Time Slips Away." "Funny How Time Slips Away" gets the royal treatment from Joe who sings this song about a man who's not quite the happy camper after his one true love has left him for another. Joe delivers this with panache and this makes a strong start for this album. "Hello Stranger" by Barbara Lewis has her singing at her very best; and I love that organ mixed in with the percussion and that backup chorus! Barbara Lewis scores a huge hit with "Hello Stranger;" and I always enjoy this tune a lot. Tierra contributes a fine hit with their love song entitled "Together;" their sound is very beautiful and the lyrics move me as Tierra sings and plays about love.

Gladys Knight & The Pips sing one of my favorite love songs of all time, "The Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me." Gladys Knight & The Pips perform this with so much feeling that it always moves me greatly when I hear this; their heartfelt emotion is very real and it never fails to touch me for this reason. "The Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me" is obviously a major highlight of this album; and you're bound to enjoy this. And a note to the person who helped me so much: THANK YOU so much for everything. (You know who you are.)

Deon Jackson sings "Love Makes the World Go Round" with a pretty melody and a fine backup chorus; and there's also Climax singing "Precious and Few." "Precious and Few" was a huge hit when it was first released and it remains a very sweet tune. The Turtles also do their "Happy Together" with that wonderful `60s flavor that I find irresistible! Great!

Roy Head does an awesome job on "Treat Her Right;" this funky melody is a true classic and Roy sure was talented! The Shangri-Las also turn in a great performance with their "Leader Of The Pack." How's about those motorcycle sound effects on "Leader Of The Pack?" It's all very good.

George Baker Selection does "Little Green Bag" with a good beat and great percussion; and "What Kind of Fool Do You Think I Am" showcases the great talent of Bill Deal & The Rhondels. The album ends well with War performing "Low Rider;" "Low Rider" is a great song and I love every minute of this number!

Overall, Oldies But Goodies, Vol. 15 was made for people who love the "oldies." These songs can never be forgotten; and you'll enjoy this CD if you like music from the good old days!

Note: The term "last waltz" used in the headline is used here as a simple expression of the truth. Just when I thought I had completed this "Oldies But Goodies" series at Volume Ten I now find that this is a fifteen, fifteen count `em, volume series. Therefore I am whipping off these last five in one day and be done with it. After all how much can we rekindle, endlessly rekindle, memories from a relatively short, if important, part of our lives, even for those who lived and died by the songs (or some of the songs) in these compilations. How many times can one read about wallflowers, sighs, certain shes (or hes), the moonlight of high school dances (if there was any) and hanging around to the bitter end for that last dance of the night to prove... what. Bastante! Enough!

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I have been doing a series of commentaries elsewhere on another site on my coming of political age in the early 1960s, but here when I am writing about musical influences I am just speaking of my coming of age, period, which was not necessarily the same thing. No question that those of us who came of age in the 1950s are truly children of rock and roll. We were there, whether we appreciated it or not at the time, when the first, sputtering, musical moves away from ballady Broadway show tunes and rhymey Tin Pan Alley pieces hit the radio airwaves. (If you do not know what a radio is then ask your parents or, ouch, grandparents, please.) And, most importantly, we were there when the music moved away from any and all music that your parents might have approved of, or maybe, even liked, or, hopefully, at least left you alone to play in peace up in your room when rock and roll hit post- World War II America teenagers like, well, like an atomic bomb.

Not all of the material put forth was good, nor was all of it destined to be playable fifty or sixty years later on some "greatest hits" compilation but some of songs had enough chordal energy, lyrical sense, and sheer danceability to make any Jack or Jill jump then, or now. And, here is the good part, especially for painfully shy guys like me, or those who, like me as well, had two left feet on the dance floor. You didn't need to dance toe to toe, close to close, with that certain she (or he for shes). Just be alive...uh, hip to the music. Otherwise you might become the dreaded wallflower. But that fear, the fear of fears that haunted many a teenage dream then, is a story for another day. Let's just leave it at this for now. Ah, to be very, very young then was very heaven.

But what about the now, seeming mandatory to ask, inevitable end of the night high school dance (or maybe even middle school) song that seems to be included in each CD compilation? The song that you, maybe, waited around all night for just to prove that you were not a wallflower, and more importantly, had the moxie to, mumbly-voiced, parched-throated, sweaty-handed, asked a girl to dance (women can relate their own experiences, probably similar). Here the Dionne Warwick's "Walk On By" fills the bill. Hey, I did like this one, especially the soulful, snappy timing and voice intonation. And, yes, I know, this is one of the slow ones that you had to dance close on. And just hope, hope to high heaven, that you didn't destroy your partner's shoes and feet. Well, one learns a few social skills in this world if for no other reason that to "impress" that certain she (or he for shes, or nowadays, just mix and match your preferences) mentioned above. I did, didn't you?