Wishin' and Votin' - the BURT BACHARACH SONGBOOK Poll Results

Hilliard is an underrated collaborator--a lot of the best pre-David (or at least pre-prime era David) songs were w/him.

Please note the opening post has a new paragraph added.

i def recognized "Nikki" as ABC theme

apropos of nothing, the title of "Hasbrook Heights" is misspelled (always dissin' Jersey)

(TIE) 55. Check Out Time — 60 Points, 1 Vote
Lyrics: Hal David
Dionne Warwick, 60 points — https://youtu.be/ZpGF9bHUF4Q

Hilliard is an underrated collaborator--a lot of the best pre-David (or at least pre-prime era David) songs were w/him.

(TIE) 55. Be True To Yourself — 60 Points, 1 Vote
Lyrics: Hal David
Bobby Vee, 60 points — https://youtu.be/UNZ1QPZiVQA

Haha. I was alone with that "Checkout Time", I see. Even Warwick dislikes it, I read. One day the world will recognise its greatness.

54. Tower of Strength — 64 Points, 2 Votes
Lyrics: Bob Hilliard
Gloria Lynne, 52 points — https://youtu.be/tgIg8KEWsbc
Frankie Vaughan, 12 points — https://youtu.be/dBdumT3Pieg
No points for the original version by Gene McDaniels with the Johnny Mann Singers.

Here is an interesting article about Gene McDaniels which I became familiar with as a side effect of this poll: https://thoughtcatalog.com/franklin-bruno/2010/08/the-left-rev-mcd-the-strange-career-of-geneeugene-mcdaniels/

I like how lyrically Lynne's is a response to the other versions, but musically basically the same song.

53. It's Love That Really Counts — 66 Points, 2 Votes
Lyrics: Hal David
The Shirelles, 1962, 36 points — https://youtu.be/DoNIF8AmPMQ
The Exciters, 1963, 30 points — https://youtu.be/qgz4jxG2O6s

I like how lyrically Lynne's is a response to the other versions, but musically basically the same song.

it doesn't sound Bacharach-y enough to me, tho it's a fine version

I'm ashamed to say I never even noticed the differences in the lyrics, as big as they are, until this thread.

52. Only Love Can Break a Heart — 67 Points, 3 Votes
Lyrics: Hal David
Gene Pitney, 67 points — https://youtu.be/71ctQukD5ZA

Had it ranked at 25

Kinda surprised it wasn't a little higher. Thanks for that Gene McDaniels article btw.

Sure. When I learned about that Gene McDaniels article, also learned about another Gene Pitney tune which I don’t think will chart and didn’t vote for myself although it’s growing on me, “Fool Killer,” which can be found on Pitney Sing Bacharach

That one's on the Rhino box, really nice.

(TIE) 50. The Answer To Everything — 68 Points, 2 Votes
Lyric: Bob Hilliard
Del Shannon, b-side to "So Long Baby," 1961, 49 points — https://youtu.be/SntWlpY4hFM
Nancy Sinatra, b-side to "True Love," 1965, 19 points — https://youtu.be/pcvDg_BeQCU

(TIE) 50. On My Own — 68 Points, 2 Votes
Lyric: Carol Bayer Sager
Patti LaBelle & Michael McDonald, 1986, 68 points — https://youtu.be/KsH63qJlIMM

Here endeth the ties.

According to the Rhino box notes, Pitney's manager screwed some stuff up behind the scenes re: "Fool Killer", ending the relationship between Pitney and Bacharach/David, and cutting the artist off from a couple songs written for him: "Trains And Boats And Planes" and "What The World Needs Now"

Oops.

Also: I saw Nick Lowe do "Tower of Strength" live once.

Story i read when i was going thru this was that Pitney turned down "Trains and Boats and Planes", telling Bacharach "it's not one of your best". Crazy talk if true

Pitney has such a singular voice, it's hard to imagine T&B&P and What the World Needs Now by him.

Well yeah but still, i like them both as songs better than "Only Love"

Great to see bobbies vee and vinton placing courtesy of my single votes. Hadn't heard either before the playlist so thanks wmc for running this

oh, for sure xp

first appearance of Bayer Aspirin, as my A&R friend calls her

Just want to say that for all my talk about wanting to rank BB's compositions outside of performance preferences, that idea went straight out the window when I started making my ballot. My #1 didn't go to what I think is his best song (mainly because I'll never settle on what that is).

49. Odds and Ends — 70 Points, 1 Vote
Lyric: Hal David
Dionne Warwick, 1969, 70 points — https://youtu.be/U4hDJ9jIspk

(many xps)

Also guaranteed to be the only ILM poll to include Trijntje* Oosterhuis (unless there will ever be a Best Dutch Pop Songs poll, and even then I wouldn’t bet on it).

*yes, “Trijntje” is how you spell her name

I could've posted the songs without specifying a performer i think but there are at least a couple that i think of as inextricably connected to a specific artist and kind of less canonically BB because of that. But i placed them pretty high just cos they are all time classics.

"Odds and Ends"=My #4. Such a great breakup song.

Thanks breastcrawl, I've fixed that spelling upthread.

(many xps)

Also guaranteed to be the only ILM poll to include Trijntje* Oosterhuis (unless there will ever be a Best Dutch Pop Songs poll, and even then I wouldn’t bet on it).

*yes, “Trijntje” is how you spell her name

Dionne Warwick's voice is just

I'll get this out of my system now. Just the most perfect interpreter of most of these songs.

48. Bond Street — 70 Points, 3 Votes
Burt Bacharach, 1967, 58 points — https://youtu.be/dFcnWVtZqlA
Enoch Light and the Light Brigade, 1969, 12 points — https://youtu.be/FZGpiNAT92c

Dangerously close to "Yakety Sax" that one

Yeah, I’m not a fan of hers as a pop
/soul singer, but this material seems to suit her (I hadn’t listened to her doing BB before).

xps

(talking about Trijntje O. here obv - thanks for fixing her name, WmC!)

I picked up the Casino Royale DVD for cheap a few months ago, need to give it another watch -- I haven't seen it since I was a kid, and all I remember is Ursula Andress being so sexy it made me uncomfortable.

47. Everybody's Out of Town — 71 Points, 4 Votes
Lyric: Hal David
B.J. Thomas, 1970 single, 71 points — https://youtu.be/l19tP_lYI1I

Dangerously close to "Yakety Sax" that one

46. To Wait For Love — 83 Points, 2 Votes
Lyric: Hal David
Tony Orlando, 1964 single, 55 points — https://youtu.be/FsGUVa-Ro58
Patti Page, 1964, 28 points — https://youtu.be/Tm05J4OjYew

discogs being extremely unforthcoming with info about the Patti Page release; that date is per the youtube

45. The Things I Will Not Miss — 88 Points, 3 Votes
Lyric: Hal David
Diana Ross & Marvin Gaye, 1973 (bonus track on Diana & Marvin reissue), 88 points — https://youtu.be/lvu1ERcj8X8

Casino Royale is a godawful movie

don't think i've ever sat thru it in one sitting but i did have the Geoff Love Orchestra album of Bond themes as a kid and CR was one of my favourites

Noooooooooooooooo :(

Taken so young

RIP Burt

Heh, I went in like a fool killer onto some random guy’s social media page to correct some misinformation he wikipasted and - promises, promisessurprise, surprise! - he took offense!

Also was just trying to think of the guy from Houston who was the missing link between Mark James, BJ Thomas and Scepter records, where he worked alongside Burt: Steve Tyrell. Believe he is now a cabaret singer doing a Burt tribute act.

Fool killer incident aside I actually did have some fun interactions and conversations about BB out there last night.

Just put up a mix based on these poll results -

https://www.mixcloud.com/centuries_of_sound/songs-by-burt-bacharach/

0:00:00 Dionne Warwick - Walk On By (1964)
0:02:49 Jackie DeShannon - What The World Needs Now Is Love (1965)
0:05:58 The Stylistics - You'll Never Get To Heaven (If You Break My Heart) (1976)
0:09:26 Wendell Stewart and the Downbeaters - (There's) Always Something There To Remind Me (1969)
0:12:27 Astrud Gilberto - Trains and Boats and Planes (1975)
0:15:04 The Carpenters - (They Long To Be) Close To You (1970)
0:18:40 Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass - Casino Royale (1967)
0:21:08 Love - My Little Red Book (1966)
0:23:36 Gene Pitney - Twenty-Four Hours From Tulsa (1963)
0:26:30 Dusty Springfield - I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself (1964)
0:29:27 Elvis Presley - Any Day Now (1969)
0:32:22 Jim O'Rourke - Something Big (1999)
0:35:17 Herb Alpert - This Guy's In Love With You (1968)
0:39:04 B.J. Thomas - Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head (1969)
0:41:56 The Free Design - The Windows of the World (1968)
0:44:20 The Fifth Dimension - One Less Bell To Answer (1970)
0:47:45 The Walker Brothers - Make it Easy On Yourself (1965)
0:50:53 Dionne Warwick - Anyone Who Had A Heart (1963)
0:53:55 Cilla Black - Alfie (1966)
0:56:27 Bobbie Gentry - I'll Never Fall In Love Again (1969)
0:59:14 The Shirelles - Baby It's You (1961)
1:01:45 Dusty Springfield - The Look of Love (1967)
1:05:15 Aretha Franklin - I Say A Little Prayer (1968)

Beautiful. That mix shares about 3/4s of the tracks with the "The Look of Love" compilation I grew up with. Bacharach tracks that I never really warmed to seem either "early" ("Magic Moments") or "late" ("That's What Friends Are For"). I've always had a bit of a feeling of frustration regarding the Jim O'Rourke cover of "Something Big", I feel like it's the musical equivalent of Gus Van Sant's "Psycho".

I found the liner notes to that box last year online:
http://albumlinernotes.com/Look_Of_Love_Disc_3.html

This is what Serene Dominic said abit it in his essential Burt Bacharach: Song By Song:

The Look of Love: The Burt Bacharach Collection. Brilliantly annotated by Alec Cumming, Patrick Milligan and Paul Grein, this smartly packaged 3-CD set is by far the best-ever gathering of Bacharach hits. A licensing nightmare, it was announced and delayed several times by Rhino before appearing hot on the heels of Painted from Memory. It concludes with Elvis’s “God Give Me Strength.”

Dominic, Serene. Burt Bacharach: Song By Song .

abit? about!This headcold I have is making my eyesight even worse.

https://www.wfmu.org/playlists/shows/124626
Good Burt tribute from Jeff Golick on Destination: OUT on the WFMU Drummer stream. Show still ongoing for another hour and a half, will be archived after it's done. Not sure if the whole show is going to be Burt but I hope so.

Thanks!

I don't have my copy of THE LOOK OF LOVE box anymore, so didn't remember this one from PROMISES, PROMISES, sung by Jill O'Hara.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKRmQhotpCQ

seems like WFMU DJ is switching gears now.

just seeing your mix now, CaL. thanks for including some of my more idiosyncratic choices!

Was watching the bedroom scene with Raquel Welch and Dudley in BEDAZZLED the other night - really! - and started thinking it was some kind of takeoff on “The Look of Love” sequence in CASINO ROYALE and the music Dudley wrote sounded vaguely like the song.

On the off chance that someone here didn't see this on Rolling Obits:

ood extended excerpts of interviews on Fresh Air this week:

Bacharach, who died Feb. 8, wrote hits in the '60s and early '70s with longtime collaborator Hal David. We listen to a 2010 interview with them, and a '98 interview with Bacharach and Elvis Costello.

https://www.npr.org/2023/02/13/1156489849/fresh-air-pays-tribute-to-legendary-composer-burt-bacharach
― dow, Tuesday, February 14, 2023 9:42 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

Also: bigass The Songs of Bacharach and Costello out Mar. 3:
https://www.elviscostello.com/the-songs-of-bacharach-costello/

― dow, Tuesday, February 14

https://www.washingtonpost.com/music/2023/03/03/elvis-costello-interview-bacharach/

From Real Gone Music newsletter:

We had this very, very special release in production when the sad news arrived of Burt Bacharach’s passing. We can think of no better way to honor the man—and the incredible vocal talent who brought his songs to life—than this 3-CD set. After all, very, very few artists have reached the heights attained by Dionne Warwick and her songwriting/production team of Bacharach and lyricist Hal David on their historic string of hit singles for the Scepter label. Over the course of a little over ten years, Dionne scored no less than 40 charting Pop hits and 29 charting R&B hits for Scepter, propelling her to a ranking second only to Aretha Franklin among female singers with the most chart hits in the rock era, not to mention five Grammy nods. More importantly, Warwick, Bacharach, and David brought a new level of sophistication to popular music…and by doing so, created some of the most indelible recordings of all time. However, despite its brilliance and lasting influence, there has never been a collection at music retail that truly captured this incredible body of work…until now. The Complete Scepter Singles 1962-1973 offers the A and B-side of every single Dionne cut for the Scepter label (with the bonus inclusion of her single for Musicor featuring the hit “Only Love Can Break a Heart”), all original, (mostly) mono single versions remastered by Mike Milchner of Sonic Vision from original tape sources and annotated by veteran music journalist and Billboard contributor Paul Grein. Among the 74 (!) tracks (all but 13 written by Bacharach and David) on this 3-CD set are some of the most hallowed sides in ‘60s pop, including “Don’t Make Me Over,” “Anyone Who Had a Heart,” “Walk On By,” “Message to Michael,” “(Theme from) Valley of the Dolls,” “I Say a Little Prayer,” “Alfie,” “Do You Know the Way to San Jose,” “Trains and Boats and Planes,” “This Girl’s in Love with You,” and “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again.” But really, pretty much every track in this collection is a masterpiece…and remember, the single mixes you’re hearing on this collection is exactly what folks thrilled to when they turned on their radio back in the day. A cornerstone of any pop music collection…and a timely tribute coinciding with the release of the new Dionne Warwick documentary Don’t Make Me Over. We are limiting this release to 3000 copies…don’t “Walk On By!”

This is actually a slight repacking of the same CD release that was used for a 2018 PBS pledge drive - you had to donate something like $200 to get it.

https://www.discogs.com/release/12472277-Dionne-Warwick-The-Complete-1960s-Singles-Plus

Highly recommended, it's the first time the original mono 45 mixes were released on CD (much less in their entirety) and the mastering is done right.

Happy Burtday

Since (most of) the Tzadik catalog is now streaming, I wondered if someone might have put this back up, and sure enough, uploaded yesterday, my #1 in this poll.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hF-JmOUbmNY

i don't know how i missed that when we did the poll, it's awesome. i'm going to look into that record.

The Burt and Serge Gainsbourg Great Jewish Music comps are almost 100% fantastic (just a couple of minor misses).

Spotify credits say it was written by Zorn LOL.

"Here I Am" would be top-10 in a zillion other songwriters' catalogues but BB/HD is so deep it showed up on one ballot.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6if2RhRr4ic

Nice one.

I heard Blossom Dearie's cover of "Trains and Boats and Planes" the other day and looked at her catalogue -- she did several Burts, none what I'd call amazing versions, just the appeal of her voice if you like her voice.

I do

deed I do