Golden Throats 4: Celebrities Butcher Songs of The Beatles

by

Various Artists

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I received this CD several days ago, and I am still laughing. This CD is every bit as fun as it sounds! Tennessee Ernie Ford, Shatner, Joe Pesci, and the rest will entertain you with their versions of songs. "Golden Throats" gives hope for ALL people who are even slightly interested in singing. If these celebraties sell their versions of Beatle songs, why can't you? For Name That Tune experts, they will be stumped even AFTER listening to these songs. Your friends will wax nostalgic after hearing these songs---nostalgic for the Beatles, that is! Fun for all generations of people, I really enjoyed the campy feeling of these songs! What fun!

The "Mission Impossible/Norwegian Wood" arrangement is truly a work of mad genuis, and William Shatner's recitation of his [?] poem "Spleen" is hilarious and inspired. On the other hand, on "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" and "Michelle", William Shatner and Xavier Hollender (repectively) sound like obnoxious persons trying very hard to be funny and failing. George Burns's rendition of "With a Little Help From My Friends" is amiable and mildly amusing, and its introduction, "In the Beginning", is an apt send-up of Paul McCartney's recent "classical" work.

The liner notes are dead wrong about Noel Harrison. He actually had (at least) two hit songs. One was a version of Leonard Cohen's "Suzanne", which went a long way toward establishing Mr. Cohen's career (as a long-standing Leonard Cohen fan, I'm grateful). The other was a Donovan tune -- "Sunshine Superman", I think it was. Besides appearing on the short-lived "The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.", Mr. Harrison did a guest spot on "My Three Sons" in which he impressed the three sons with his singing and guitar playing. I can't remember how he sounded on these other tunes, but on the tune included here, "She's a Woman" he is hapless; he seems to have great difficulty sustaining a pitch; and to the extent he can sustain a pitch, he is significantly flat. Otherwise he sounds rather like David Bowie on the old "Images" album (re-released as "Deram").

"Golden Throats Volume Four"'s liner notes are not merely inaccurate, by the way, they also tend to be very annoying. Next time hold the wisecracks; give us just the facts and let the performances speak for themselves -- and get the facts RIGHT!