Mission Statement

Guilty Pleasures: The Music Edition is intended as a forum to review songs that were once considered out-of-favor. Readers are asked to rate the songs using a 10 point voting system (10=strong like, 1=strong dislike) and provide their comments.

The objective is to review the songs offered here with a fresh listen for things like intent (objective), structure, influences (to or from), production value, and performances, all within the context of its musical time frame and while trying to forget past reactions. Hopefully we can hear something different in a song we once thought was less-than-pleasing.

So remember, valid reactions include:

1) None of my friends ever liked this song, but I always did.

2) I never liked this song, but listening to it again after all this time now it makes me want to: (a) tap my foot, or (b) shove a pencil in my ear.

All legit.

-Ken

Friday, March 25, 2011

"Release Me" by Engelbert Humperdink

As we all dog-paddle like mad to keep afloat in a sea of Facebook postings, I seemed to have lost the energy and inspiration to post my Guilty Pleasures: The Music Edition of late. Truth be told, I wasn't really sure of the value-add in providing a weekly vehicle to let Michele and Maurice point out the lack of any redeeming quality, musically and lyrically, in my picks that Angela wasn't old enough to remember, but I did miss the history lesson Paul would give on the rhythm section of each recording.  Really, I always enjoyed the feedback from everyone, and I'm thick-skinned (and thick-headed) enough to handle the heat. So, I've decide to pick up the musical torch again in an effort to validate (or not) past musical guilt and post something every Friday. That's right friends, Friday is now Guilty Pleasures Day until further notice (or until Michele's head explodes).   ;-)

And this one may just do it.

Born Arnold George Dorsey, Engelbert Humperdink actually renamed himself after a 19th century composer on the suggestion of his manager to kick-start his languishing career. Good idea, it seems, as he scored his first International hit shortly after that with a single that knocked The Beatles "Strawberry Fields Forever" out of the top slot in the charts - no easy feat in 1967. But the best fun-fact from his Wikipedia page is the quote he provided when irked by an interviewer who suggested he was a "crooner", which he took as an insult:  "No crooner has the range I have. I can hit notes a bank could not cash." Oh yeah...

Sure, his performance on "After The Lovin'" is the ballad by which all lounge singers are measured, but "Release Me" by Engelbert Humperdink is a single so good that the pop audiences never realized (or didn't care) it was a country ballad, as with his versions of "Am I That Easy To Forget", and "The Last Waltz".

Note: On further review, I must admit the main reason for bringing this song to your attention is to start the ground-swell of support to get the best country singer in San Francisco, Charlie Owen, to sing this at the next El Rio Trainwreck jam. If it isn't in his repertoire all ready, it should be.

Enjoy.


-KO

ps: remember, highlited song titles in the postings are links to the youtube song.
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