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

Was leaning towards voting for the Isaac Hayes cover at first as it's such a remarkable interpretation but the Dionne Warwick version is just undeniable.

Great work on this poll WmC.

"I hope I never get hit in the REEEEEEAR again," that has serious chart potential!

Thank you to everyone who voted! You made the poll!

Right back atcha - great work WmC.

That two-piano thing is cool -- I don't have the ears to hear that sort of stuff but it's clear when he explains it.

Was leaning towards voting for the Isaac Hayes cover at first as it's such a remarkable interpretation but the Dionne Warwick version is just undeniable.

Great work on this poll WmC.

FULL RESULTS!
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1v_FblscHY1ticvw2kf8JR12ZMKxMTe-IS320FFBG-78/edit#gid=1651280581

My Mike Patton vote ("She's Gone Away") fell just outside the top 60, damn it.

If "The Last One To Be Loved" doesn't place, I'll be very sorry I didn't vote.

― zama roma ding dong (Eric H.), Friday, May 17, 2019 8:55 AM (five hours ago)

I hate to break this to you, Eric, but...

I was secretly Wishin’ and Hopin’ for a “Sinner’s Devotion.”

Speaking of which, I didn't know Tammy Montgomery went on to become Tammi Terrell until this poll.

Favorite version of "Walk On By"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmEgxqSnHXQ

Thanks WmC, very enjoyable roll out.

The top 10 individual vote-getters would be

1. Dionne - Walk On By - 821
2. Dusty - The Look of Love - 708
3. Dionne - Anyone Who Had a Heart - 654
4. Aretha - I Say a Little Prayer - 618
5. Herb - This Guy's in Love w/You - 595
6. Dusty - I Just Don't Know What to Do w/Myself - 572
7. Dionne - Do You Know the Way to San Jose - 538
8. Jackie D - What the World Needs Now - 524
9. Dionne - Don't Make Me Over - 467
10. Dionne - I'll Never Fall in Love Again

"Baby It's You" and "Make It Easy on Yourself" getting sizeable bumps from the aggregate of good versions. Dionne gets 5 of the top 10 spots for individual performances, not really a surprise.

*wakes up and immediately checks final few tracks.*

Excellent. Very nice work, WmC. Thanks!

Think this was the most fun since the Elvis POLL, perhaps even more fun.

It's hard for me to separate out pure childhood nostalgia from the jazz craft of a lot of these tunes but i assume that the craft is explaining a lot of the permanent love, for me, anyway

― Doctor Nu (Noodle Vague), Friday, May 17, 2019 1:05 PM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
I mean this stuff remains classic and evocative for a bunch of reasons i hadn't thought through until we did this

― Doctor Nu (Noodle Vague), Friday, May 17, 2019 1:07 PM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

xps -- mmmmmaybe? But I find the songs so amazing I even like "bad" versions, and craft can't explain that for me.

― WmC, Friday, May 17, 2019 1:08 PM (four hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Although I did get on board with the Rhino Box, come to think of it.

So, I voted for all of the top 5! "I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself" was the second track I remember vividly from my otherwise seemingly Bacharach-free early childhood. Wish I had that childhood nostalgia for more of them, tbh.

Four of my selections didn't make the top 60. (I apparently had some company with the first two though. Bless.)

Living Together, Growing Together
Paper Mache
Try to See It My Way
The Breaking Point

Ella Fitzgerald cut an album for Reprise in 69 with a bunch of Brit session players covering Motown, Beatles, Randy Newman etc. Her version of ‘The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game’ is particularly suited to her.

― Dan Worsley, Friday, May 17, 2019 2:40 PM (three hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Cheers Wm! this very much needed done also i can use it to dig into the stuff that i shd've dug into before

Thanks! I'm really happy with how the poll turned out -- could have used more ballots, but everybody who did vote brought a ton of enthusiasm and well-considered choices. I'm going to hang on to that spotify deep-dive playlist, now up to 675 tracks, and keep adding to it as I find things. If nothing else, it's something for other spotify users to drag from to create their own exploration and personal listening lists. Speaking of spotify, thanks Nag! Nag! Nag! for creating the results playlist.

Thank you to everyone who voted! You made the poll!

I haven't opened the spreadsheet, but I'm guessing this doozy didn't get any votes. Have never seen the movie, but I *definitely* know the chorus; am thinking I heard it performed by some children show's ensemble circa 1973. Never knew it was Bacharach.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46stUnjT71c

sally kellerman is so dreamy

hat-tip to whoever the other "Three Wheels On My Wagon" voter was

According to the memoir, there are FIVE pianos on “What’s New Pussycat?”

But tbh I can’t hear any piano at all

"I'l Never Fall In Love Again," sung by Jill O'Hara, Jerry Orbach, from the Promises, Promises OCR is great, thanks, and the vibe is totally reminiscent of "Frank Mills," sung by Shelley Plimpton on the Hair OCR.

The replacement cast for the original Broadway PP included Lorna Luft and Tony Roberts.

Interesting.

After Burt had stopped conducting for Marlene, I ran into her in Beverly Hills one day. I chased after her and said, “Marlene!” And then I said, “Burt would love to hear from you,” or “I’m so sorry things aren’t working out.” And she said, “Finita la commedia.”

Ah, just got to the part in the book where Neil Simon wanted Tony Roberts to replace Jerry Orbach in the original cast during rehearsals, but then changed his mind at the last minute.

If this thread has that Geico commercial it should certainly have
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OBLMbJnN69c

William, I don’t know why you keep saying this book is so short, my copy is 400 pages long. Don’t think it can just be that the ebook has a different numbering system.

It's short compared to Robert Caro's Bacharach: Master of The Melody (#3 of 5 Volumes)

The hardcover is 280 pp.

It's short compared to Robert Caro's Bacharach: Master of The Melody (#3 of 5 Volumes)

L

Finished the book, which I will also recommend. Now to see if I can find one of the volumes by that fellow from Cairo.

Tbh thought it was one of the better memoirs that I have read. Lots of good detail about his working process and on the personal front there is lots of interspersed text from others such as Angie Dickinson so it is not just from his point of view.

So, as to why I put “Mexican Divorce” at number one:

• Knew it wouldn't win but wanted it to place high
• Think highly of the Bob Hilliard collabos in general
• Historic importance of being the session at which Dionne Warwick and Burt made first contact
• The fact that Paul Griffin probably played on this as well as Steely Dan's "Haitian Divorce" (although I don't have confirmation of either of these things)
• The genre-bending: seems like from the music it is going to be a South of the Border novelty song a la The Coaster's "Down In Mexico" mixed with a touch of Mary Robbins' "El Paso" but then it turns into a kind of breakup song (albeit with a tacked on happy ending), echoed decades later in the fireworks-shooting Mexican kids in X's "4th of July"
• The jaunty but lugubrious beat, and they way it is reflected in the slow funereal march of the almost monosyllabic lyrics, the numbed out I can't believe this is happening of it all until the breakout of two three syllable words in "Mexico is different"
• The detail of the "travel folder," as evocative as Hal David's "thumbing" through the Little Red Book.

^ love this

Yes -- like I said, well-considered choices all around.

Forgot to mention the “old adobe courthouse.” Okay, I’m done.

sad i didn't get the time to vote, if only because it meant that nobody voted for roland kirk's "say a little prayer" :(

(actually i would've voted ground zero, but close enough!)

Thought maybe he got a vote for another tune like "You'll Never Get To Heaven (If You Break My Heart)" but seems that was not the case.

Hal David's birthday yesterday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bp2AKAhPkZs

This is more relevant perhaps:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0rZEi_lT-o

Weird thing I just came across about the group called Smith mentioned several times up thread, they did a version of “The Weight” which is on the Easy Rider soundtrack. Lead vocal is by a dude this time. For a split second I thought it was actually The Band with Levon singing, although I got over it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMQ6QrsTPfw

They seem to be one of the only groups, perhaps the only group, not mentioned on the album cover.