Nancy Osborne – Hot Swing, Cool Jazz (CD)
Sound:
B Music: B-
Nancy
Osborne is a good singer and having the talent to be a good Jazz vocalist is a
plus. However, like even the greatest
singers (Aretha Franklin at Columbia Records, for instance), the wrong
arrangements can kill you. This happens
on her new album Hot Swing, Cool Jazz,
where her covers of classics like It’s
De-Lovely and Something’s Gotta Give
are of the “sing at you” variety that never works.
Her Mister Sandman is such a misfire, I wanted
to watch Halloween II a couple of
times to remember how joyful that film was.
Ding Dong! The Witch Is Dead
will remind you more of Margaret Thatcher than Margaret Hamilton. I’ve
Got You Under My Skin sounds like a bad lounge act at a dermatologist’s
convention. Nice lady? Very likely.
Good album? No. Bizarre enough for a listen? You decide, but have that Halloween II DVD on hand just in case.
The PCM
16bit/44.1kHz Stereo is not bad, which is all the more frustrating because if
the arrangements were more “with it” and the like, this would have been a gem
of an album.
- Nicholas Sheffo
