I have quite a lot of Sinatra but I have never actually read a biog of the man. The only proper piece I’ve read out him is “Frank Sinatra Has A Cold” by Gay Talese, although I have read Rat Pack Confidential by Shawn Levy which I did enjoy a lot).
Anyone here read able to recommend me one? I genuinely have no idea where to start. If there’s an equivalent of “Last Train To Memphis/Careless Love” for Frank, I’d love to know.
This is beautiful, because it focusses (<this does not look right) on his singing, his art, and leaves the sleaze to others:
Hot off the press, an article in the LRB.
http://www.lrb.co.uk/v37/n13/ian-penman/swoonatra
Oh jeez … it’s Ian Penman.
It can’t be. I can understand it.
Hmmm… sleaze please Louise! (Well at least some, not too keen on anything too technical about singing)
Try this one:
http://i917.photobucket.com/albums/ad15/camplimp/frank_the_voice_by_james_kaplan_zpsbm3waot5.jpg
(Frank: The Voice by James Kaplan)
I would seriously avoid Kitty Kelley’s hatchet job unless you really dislike Sinatra.
The thing about Frank is he was great. Kind of a shit. But great. The thing about books about Frank? They’re all shit.
The book by his butler was mildly interesting about the flat-voiced fuck.
I’ve never heard anyone (well, anyone who knows what they’re talking about) say that about Sinatra. Critics have, occasionally, said he sings slightly sharp which is quite rare for a singer – and maybe related to the brass instruments he hears while singing – which have a similar tendency. But flat? No.
No Sinatra playlist at your restaurant then, I take it?
Ah … the old “flat as a plate of piss” thing. Usually levelled at Sinatra by admirers of the Tony Bennet vein-popping technique. A bit of vibrato (nature’s own Autotune) always impresses,
There is – inevitably – a group of very superior musical critics (none of them paid) who sneer at Sinatra. Ian – bless his poly-cotton drawers – professes to be one of them but we needn’t take him too seriously. They say (well, as close as you can get on the internet to “saying”) that Sinatra just can’t sing. Then they go and work onthe “Apollo Landings A HOAX” sites they’re curating.
‘Dino’ by Nick Tosches is an excellent book about a superior artist.
Would have thought you’re far too independent a thinker to fall for such utter revisionist tosh as the ludicrous “Dean better than Frank” schtick.
No revisionism here. Thought so from the very beginning. Dean is wonderfully warm, smooth and mellifluous.
So’s Billy Eckstine. Doesn’t mean either are “superior artists”.
Billy Eckstine makes me want to run away and hide.
Eckstine is a freaking nightmare. A camped-up showboat for the Elk’s Convention supper.
The elephant in the room here is Mel Tormé. His “sides” (I love saying that – makes me feel like Ralph Gleason) with Marty Paitch, or better, his perfect It’s A Blue World album. If you haven’t heard it, you’re not as hip as you like to think you are.
*copies and pastes to get accent in* Tormé’s version of Mountain Greenery is a work of genius.
Yebbut – Blue World, Mike? Eh? Eh?
Dino is certainly a superior artist. Just not superior to Sinatra.
Nicely put, Mike. *matey slap on back*
Billy Eckstine? Didn’t he manage The Fabs (groan). Never knowingly heard him. As for Torme – the Velvet Frog, wasn’t it?. Didn’t he marry Thora Hird? Don’t like Bennett at all. Aside from the fact that he was a despicable, bullying, Mafiosi boot-licking thug, Frank’s voice grates on me awfully – every note lands plonkingly flat. That galumphing delivery doesn’t help either. Plus, he couldn’t sing ‘country’ like Dino. There’s yer proof right there as to who’s superior.
If you need a good laugh, take a look at Elvis’s comeback appearance, post-Army, on Sinatra’s show. They attempt each other’s genre. Elvis effortlessly swings and kills it; Frank arthritically ‘rocks’ and dies on his arse. Dino was one of Elvis’s major influences; I never heard of him ever referencing Sinatra.
You might want to have a look at one of the many Ava Gardner bios. I know a well reviewed one came about a few years back, but cannot remember author. She was married to Sinatra and, if I’m right, the book in question painted a fairly sympathetic picture of him, at variance with the cartoonish mafioso/ratpack oaf he is sometimes portrayed as.
The Ava book. I think it’s the one by Lee Server.
Yes I Can by Sammy Davis Jr
But only if Frank says it’s ok
I recommend this, and not just because I published it: http://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/12/books/books-in-brief-nonfiction-he-s-still-back-again.html