NANCY WILSON - I will be Live Tweeting the LP "Gentle Is My Love" by Nancy Wilson. It's Capitol Stereo (ST 2351), two sides of course...
I just got this record today at Goodwill. I looked at it last night and didn't get it. I didn't have any money but I could've borrowed some.
It seemed like it looked a little scratchy but nothing terrible. Anyway I put it back, then went back today expecting it to still be there.
I got it. 50 big cents. The cover is extremely nice and the record isn't bad at all. I cleaned it and recorded it to MP3. It's on my iPod.
I like Nancy Wilson but I don't see her records around like I used to. I probably have 6 or 7 different ones.
One other proviso: I don't know much about music, like I can't use a bunch of musical terms, ballad, notes, falsetto runs, all that...
So it will be short & sweet, the general theme & sense of a song as we progress through it. I barely have any followers so it's no big deal.
I don't what would happen to a guy with 12,000 followers if he Live Tweeted an entire album. They'd probably run screaming.
OK, enough prologue. On with the album. 6 songs on side 1, 5 songs on side 2.
The album is full of romantic melodies, an entire album of romantic tempos. It's a fairly blue sounding record, crystal clear, but moody.
I heard it from the other room while it was recording. It sounded like late night listening, the lights low, a nice bachelor's lounge.
1) Who Can I Turn To (When Nobody Needs Me) - The liner notes say this is a masterful study in desolation. I love the description.
Soft, moody, wondering, going where destiny leads. No star to guide me, no one beside me, I'll go on my way, darkness will hide me.
But maybe tomorrow I'll find what I'm after, throw off sorrow. With you. But who can I turn to if you turn away.
That's a very pretty song. I'm almost sorry she has the hope of happiness, because I want desolation to be desolate, no bright side.
That might be a little heavy though for a song. She's going for her share of laughter, yet it's there, What if YOU turn away? (He won't.)
2) There Will Never Be Another You. Lighter, breezier right off the bat. (So beautiful fidelity to the recording.)
There'll be other nights like this, other experiences she'll know as the seasons pass, but there'll never be another you. Nice theme.
Very lavish orchestration in the middle. It's like listening to a super CD. Nancy's voice comes back to dream a million dreams. Lovely.
[Live Tweeting the Nancy Wilson LP from 1965 "Gentle Is My Love" - Song 3 coming, "If Love Is Good To Me"
Spring will come, grass will grow, brooks will hum with melted snow, if love is good to me.
Good things will happen, always with skies of blue. "As long as Mother Nature makes you love me." Kind of a stair-step, building song.
Everything depends on you, my dear. It will ALL be if love is good to me. I don't know this song but it's lovely.
The arrangements have strings, a touch of brass and reeds, and an easy but ever-present rhythm. -- from the liner notes.
Next is song 4, side 1: "My One and Only Love." Notes: She warmly spreads her mystic vocal charms over the haunting melody.
The touch of your hand is like heaven, a heaven I've never known. Everything about the lover is transformative, making her heart sing.
You appear in all your splendor, my one and only love. "Mystic charms" is actually part of the lyric, "your lips so warm and tender."
Every song on this album so far is beautifully lush. Listening to Nancy Wilson would make even Jethro Bodine seem classy.
Next, the 5th song: "Funnier Than Funny". I heard this one a while ago. It's more playful.
Notes say "On the sunny side, you'll find yourself delighting in the subtlety of FUNNIER THAN FUNNY..."
Everything is "funnier than funny." Memories can bring happiness by pleasures they impart. It's funny how they captivate your heart.
How you and I can share a kiss, then talk of funny things like this is very funny, funnier than funny. Excellent romantic, playful song.
Really concerns the wonders of love.
Next, the 6th song on the LP, the last song of side 1, "More."
Starts with an evocative strings section and single horn.
Oh, this is the "More than the greatest love the world has ever known" song. If it's the one I'm thinking of. It sounds a little familiar.
More than you'll ever know, my arms long to hold you so. A pretty romantic song of yearning, wow.
Waking, sleeping, laughing, weeping. -- "Far beyond forever you'll be mine." -- "I know I've never lived before..."
Stunning with the horn coming back in. "No one else could love you more."
Time to flip the album. Side 2, Song 1, "Gentle Is My Love." The title song to the album.
He's sweet and tender, not at all like you. So there's some comparison of lovers. "So gentle is my love," meaning HE, her love, is gentle.
He's not demanding. (So her ex must've been a monster to get a song like this."
You made me feel I was owned by you, while you could do what you wanted to. Now I have someone who belongs to me, etc.
This isn't what I expected. Kind of a tough sentiment: You suck, but he's great.
He's not like you. We don't need orchestration for a song like this, but maybe a honky tonk combo and a sputtering Nancy Wilson!
Definitely "Gentle Is My Love" is the worst song on the record so far. Hard to believe it is the title song. The title evokes better!
OK, continuing with Side 2. That was definitely a downer. I'll try to press on but I'm disappointed. Let me collect my thoughts here...whoa.
Song 8 is "At Long Last Love." The notes say "She ushers in dream time with two very familiar love songs done more slowly and...
meaningfully than ever before..." MORE was the 1st one, and AT LONG LAST LOVE the 2nd. --- So we're ushering in dream time again...
At Long Last Love - Is it an earthquake or simply a shock? Is it the good turtle soup or merely the mock? Is it a cocktail, this feeling?
OR....is it the REAL McCOY, meaning is it "At Long Last Love"? Very exploratory song, expansive thoughts, wondering, examining love...
Definitely we're back in the realm of the great romantic sound here. Enough strings in the orchestra to fly a million kites. Beautiful...
Next is the 9th song, "Time After Time." I wonder how many songs have this title. This is NOT the Cyndi Lauper song, of course...
Time after time, I tell myself that I'm so lucky to be loving you. So lucky to be the one you run to see in the evening ...
This is a reflective song, reminiscing on the benefits of the love we've shared. With "Time after time" you've heard me say I was lucky.
This is a great romantic song to celebrate an anniversary. It would make him or her cry. Or at least give you a special kiss afterwards.
I like it.
Next, the 10th song (out of 11), "If Ever I Would Leave You."
Starts with the title. "It wouldn't be in summer, seeing you in summer I never would go..." I've heard this song before somewhere.
I think it'll be I'll never leave you now, then, anytime.
If I'd ever leave you it couldn't be in autumn, how I'd leave in autumn I'd never know...
This song gives the idea of leaving you but then knows it can't be done. Like saying "I don't like you ... I LOVE YOU."
So it's a good romantic track, for all seasons. Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring ... then it's all recapitulated at the end.
Never could I leave you AT ALL. Good sentiment. I don't know about that though. Why are you even contemplating leaving me?
NOW, our last song, Number 11. Guess they couldn't come up with a 12th song to round out the album. 6 one side, 5 the other. Chintzy.
You want better balance than that, 6 and 6, an even number, not 11. Why'd they do that? Just to save on royalties? C'mon.
But it's been a long time back, 1965 thereabouts, and chances are it's too late to make it right, so we'll accept it, have to, there's 11.
Number 11: "When He Makes Music." From notes: "To close this superb album...the very dramatic WHEN HE MAKES MUSIC....
A fitting choice, for the tune's lyric captures the feeling Nancy's incomparable performances bestir in songwriter and listener alike...
Love the horn, swelling orchestra. It is more dramatic. "All he has to do is say hello, and that's the sweetest melody I know..."
The sound of angels singing soft and low...when he makes music. The vocals are more searching, hesitant, reaching, lots of feeling.
The lyric speaks of a symphony beginning, and the orchestra swells there. Then a million violins, enunciated by swelling violins. Beautiful.
He makes music only I can hear. -- Very nice, the sense that her beloved is hers alone and that's the way it should be..."
You wonder sometime how people fall in love, what they see in the other person. But it's music only they can hear.
I'm definitely tone deaf about some of the people I see, like walking through Wal-Mart, like How'd THOSE two ever get together?
But that's Mother Nature, composing her symphonies in the many bodies produced, attracted and attracting with "music only he/she can hear."
This is a very nice album. The overall tone is reflective, often prolonging whatever sentiment is being expressed, making it expressive.
Each song is excellent, except for the sub-par "Gentle Is My Love." That song was a downer and shall forever remain one, no redeeming it.
This has been a Live Tweeting of the NANCY WILSON LP, "Gentle Is My Love." Nancy's beautiful and a beautiful singer. Sing on, Nancy!
