Frank Sinatra: Songs for Swingin' Lovers! (Blue Note Tone Poet Series) [BLUE NOTE]

Why you'll love it

This Tone Poet edition is cut directly from the original analog tapes at Cohearent Audio and pressed in mono on 180g vinyl at RTI, in a gatefold jacket. It was the first album ever to top the UK Albums Chart, and it entered the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2000.

This edition

• Blue Note Tone Poet Series
• Mono
• 180g vinyl
• Cut from the original analog tapes
• Mastered at Cohearent Audio
• Pressed at RTI
• Gatefold jacket

About the album

After the late-night heartbreak of In the Wee Small Hours, Sinatra put on his hat at a jauntier angle. He went back into Capitol's Hollywood studio on Melrose Avenue in October 1955 and January 1956 with Nelson Riddle, and the two of them took a stack of existing pop standards and swung them harder and hipper than anyone had thought to.

Riddle's charts are a masterclass in patience, building slowly and then letting the brass loose, and nowhere more famously than on "I've Got You Under My Skin," where the trombone solo arrives like a door flung open. "You Make Me Feel So Young" bounces, "Pennies from Heaven" and "Old Devil Moon" glide, and "Anything Goes" winks at the audience. Voyle Gilmore produced, and the one ballad, "We'll Be Together Again," earns its place by contrast.

Sinatra devotees often rank it his best, or a close second to Wee Small Hours, and Rolling Stone put it in its 500 greatest albums. Seeing it in a jazz audiophile series makes perfect sense once you hear that band. In 1957 Capitol reshot the cover so Sinatra faced the young couple instead of turning his back on them, which seems the polite thing to do.

Also at Kops: more Frank Sinatra on vinyl · browse Vocal Jazz

Tracklist

Listen

On Capitol / Blue Note (cat# W 653), a reissue of the 1956 album.