Proving His Underratedness

I was happy to see Darcy’s tribute to Randy Newman. I can’t agree, however, that Randy Newman (Creates Something New Under the Sun) is a “disaster.” Sure, its notably inferior to the three remarkable albums that followed it, but it has some of his finest songs (“Davy the Fat Boy,” “Cowboy,” “I Think It’s Going To Rain Today”), and even some of the throwaways are worth going back to (I’m especially partial to “The Beehive State.”) I guess I see it as an uneven (and with frequently very dated arrangements) but still important and enjoyable album, like his 80s stuff (Trouble in Paradise has even better songs, but also has more members of Toto, so it’s more or less a wash.)

I was also interested to see his link to this list of forthcoming books in the 33 1/3 series, which has produced some interesting stuff. I immediately see books about three of my all-time favorites (69 Love Songs, Swordfishtrombones, Marquee Moon) , and then some that are nearly in that class (Horses, Double Nickels on the Dime, People’s Instinctive Travels and the Paths of Rhythm), and then lots of other good stuff, and…a Celine Dion record? (And I see it’s apparently the one with the song about the sinking boat on it…double shudder.) I’m not familiar with the author, so I don’t know if it’s sincere or an ironic-hipster thing, but either way that can’t be good…