Thursday, July 14, 2016

The Heart of Rock & Soul # 913 The Cleftones


'Another of George Goldberg's inspired doo-wop revampings of Tin Pan alley's classics. Heart and soul was written in 1938 for the film short A Song is Born and hit Number One the same year in a version by Larry Clinton, though Goldner probably modelled the Cleftones arrangement pn the 1952 remake by yje Four Aces. But even though Hoagy Carmichael undoubtedly wrote blusier than any other showtune composer, (including Gershwin), he and Frank Loesser could never have dreamed that any of their standards would get such a radical reworking. Though the Latin bass guitar work is near-traditional, and the Darin/Dion-type lead not far from it, the beat changes more powerfully than in any previous rendition, the horn lines are loopy to the point of intoxication, and the swooping bass voice is simply outrageous, each 'Yeaaaaah' transforming the original corn into something positively thrilling.'



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