I didn't appreciate Tony Bennett till I bought a greatest hits album 10 years ago, and figured out the underlying sad, hopeful, lonely, wistful spirit in his existential music.
Tony Bennett songs have the opposite effect on you from Frank Sinatra songs. Sinatra's more boisterous and full of individual ambition. Bennett sings about how his life hasn't been a success and leaves you a little sad. Try listening to dueling greatest hits albums. It's amazing that Bennett is still singing on stage without detriment. It's because he never had the greatest voice to begin with, so he didn't have much voice to lose. I remember in the late 50s there was a Coke ad campaign with Tony Bennett contest stuff inside the bottlecaps. He was already as big as Dean Martin or Sinatra and it was a few years before the San Francisco song. From my greatest hits album, I learned that he had huge national hits 12 years before 50 years ago, songs that still sound great to today's ears. (I never saw American Psycho. Is that one of those crappy new talkies? I'm boycotting till they go back to silent movies.)
[video=youtube;g1mSJpOBXFU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g1mSJpOBXFU[/video] Feel free to turn off your sound, if you'd like -- here's a transcript so you can read along!
