Manilow: Back to the ’70s

First he did songs from the ’50s. Then the songs from the ’60s. Then recently, Barry Manilow released his Songs from the Seventies CD. As expected the album put everybody on a massive nostalgia kick. Admit it, non-fans call him corny or cheesy or uncool but one day when he is singing Maroon 5’s This Love for his Songs from the 2000 album, they too, will admit nobody brings back memories the way Manilow does.

The Seventies CD is another gem of a song selection and production. It may look easy but this is actually a difficult job. It means going through thousands of hit songs and putting one’s finger on which ones will go into the album as the most definitive of specific period. The music arrangements are also tricky, as these must sound new and not old-fashioned but not too different from the originals. Uniformly, all must be lush and dreamy as just like in a movie, this album will provide the background music to memories being replayed in millions of minds.

The main ingredient of the brew is of course Manilow himself. Despite millions of albums sold, much continues to be said about his inadequacies as a singer. Well, it is time now for those who think that to eat crow. Manilow has once again taken great songs from an era and made them his own. It is his third time at bat and it is again a homerun. They cannot argue with that kind of success anymore, more so when they hear his soaring but intimate rendition of Simon & Garfunkel’s Bridge Over Troubled Waters and Neil Diamond’s He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother. He has once more kicked his so-called dying career into high gear and gotten all of us wondering if he intends to do Songs of the Eighties anytime soon and what hits will go into it.

Unlike his Sixties, which missed out on Motown, Manilow pretty much covers everything going on musicwise in the Seventies. Setting the pace is surely the most loved song of the decade, Barbra Streisand’s The Way We Were. Also included are My Eyes Adored You by Frankie Valli; How Can You Mend a Broken Heart by The Bee Gees; Albert Hammond’s It Never Rains in Southern California; a duet of James Taylor’s You’ve Got a Friend with a star from the ’70s, Melissa Manchester; Sailing by Christopher Cross; The Long and Winding Road by The Beatles; They Long to be (Close to You) by The Carpenters, If  by Bread and Elton John’s Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word.

And will a Seventies’ collection be complete without music by Manilow? His songs were among the biggest sellers and among the most remembered from those years. So it is only fair that he includes some of his own. He chose Mandy, Weekend in New England, Copacabana (At the Copa), Even Now, Looks Like We Made It and I Write the Songs. He did not use the original recordings. Instead he recorded them again acoustic style with only his own piano accompaniment. Nice touch.

Barry’s Fifties, Sixties and Seventies albums are sold individually but if you like Manilow, I think you should get all three because they show him at his best as an interpreter. Besides, as mentioned before, Barry and the guys behind him do know how to pick out the best among the hits.

The Fifties has Moments to Remember by the Four Lads; It’s All in the Game by Tommy Edwards; Unchained Melody by Roy Hamilton; Venus by Frankie Avalon; It’s Not for Me to Say by Johnny Mathis; Love is a Many Splendored Thing by the Four Aces; Rags to Riches by Tony Bennett; a medley of Sincerely and Teach Me Tonight with Phyliss MaGuire of the MaGuire Sisters; Are You Lonesome Tonight by Elvis Presley; Young at Heart by Frank Sinatra; All I Have to Do is Dream by the Everly Brothers; What a Difference a Day Made by Dinah Washington; and Beyond the Sea by Bobby Darin.

The Sixties has Can’t Take My Eyes Off You by Valli; a medley of Cherish and Windy with original artists The Association; Can’t Help Falling in Love by Elvis; There’s a Kind of Hush by Herman’s Hermits; Bobby Vinton’s Blue Velvet; Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head by B.J. Thomas; And I Love Her by The Beatles; Everybody Loves Somebody by Dean Martin; This Guy’s in Love with You by Dionne Warwick; You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling by the Righteous Brothers; When I Fall in Love by the Lettermen; Strangers in the Night by Frank Sinatra; and What the World Needs Now is Love by Jackie de Shannon.