Search - Dick Haymes :: Cocktail Hour: Dick Haymes

Here is ballad magic.

Paul Phelps | Ambler, PA United States | 01/26/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is a satisfying album for liking soft and warm ballad singing. It's a successful compilation of songs from Dick's entire career and is a good sampling of his talent. There's a lot of nostalgia in it."

Still waiting for a comprehensive Dick Haymes compilation

Paul Tognetti | Cranston, RI USA | 06/14/2005

(2 out of 5 stars)

"When I think of the "sound" of the 1940's three names immediately come to mind--The Andrews Sisters, The Mills Brothers and Dick Haymes. For a good many years now I have been searching in vain for a single disc collection of Dick Haymes biggest and best. Given the fact that most of Dick's most successful records were in the 2 to 3 minute range and given his status as one of the most popular and prolific artists of that decade, it is not unreasonable to expect that at some point a comprehensive 20 to 25 track single disc collection of his charted hits would be available. But alas, this is not the case. And believe me I have been searching for just such a collection for more than a decade now.

In a moment of weakness I purchased "Dick Haymes: Cocktail Hour". I don't know what I was drinking but I am usually a lot more particular about the CD's I choose to add to my collection.

While "Cocktail Hour" may be marginally acceptable for casual fans or the curious, I definitely would not recommend this bogus 2 disc set to collectors. As another reviewer observed there is absolutely no reason why all of the material contained on these discs could not have been put onto a single CD. There is scarcely an hours worth of music here. Secondly, while this package does include a few of Dick Haymes biggest hit records including "You'll Never Know" and "It's Magic", it is far more notable for the tunes it does not offer. Big hits like "The More I See You", "Little White Lies" and "Till The End of Time" are simply nowhere to be found. In addition, Allegro records has sprinkled the disc with "live" recordings. Many of these tracks are less than 2 minutes long. The liner notes read like the gossip page of a tabloid with seemingly more information about Dick's six marriages than on his music. This is just one of those cases where I will chalk it up to experience and donate the darn thing to the public library. In the meantime my search for the perfect Dick Haymes collection goes on. Extremely disappointing!"

Lame!

W. Decker | 02/27/2005

(2 out of 5 stars)

"This is a lame collection. Some of the tracks sound really muffled and bad. The songs could easily fit onto one disc instead of two. Instead of a discography, there is a sketchy history of Haymes the celebrity, with no mention of musical considerations. The artwork is hideous: a caricature that bears no resemblance to the man. This works only as a casual introduction to the crooner."