Search - Les Brown :: Bandland / Revolution in Sound

Mixed musical program with very good cd production values

comtad | 05/11/2001

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This two-fer early 1960's Les Brown reissue is a musical mixed bag. "Bandland" alone is worth the price of admission. It features 40's nostalgia tunes played with the usual Brown style of conservative and tasteful swing augmented by a percussion section."Revolution in Sound", however, takes the proceedings down a notch or two. It features stereophonic recreation a revolving bandstand scenario which was popular in the 1940's. What happens here is that the band slowly fades in from the right channel until the tune they are playing begins to end. Then the band fades to the left channel as the next tune begins to fade in, giving the impression of a revolving bandstand.The biggest problem with this that most of the tunes are well under three minutes long with one (unfortunately one of the potentially better tunes in the program "This Could Be the Start of Something") a mere one minute and twenty-three seconds in length. So there's not much of a groove to get into. What's worse is that Les Brown apparently gave in to producers and many tunes such as "Lisbon Antigua", "Tea for Two Cha Cha" among others, are embarrassingly commercial.The band, however, is in prime form for "This Could Be the Start of Something", "Stompin' at the Savoy" and "One O'Clock Jump." But, again, they are so short that you feel roundly dissapointed when they begin there required fade-aways.My four stars are given for the band's nice work on "Bandland", the excellent remastered sound and colorful production values of the "Collectables" cd which includes original album liner notes and artwork, detailed player personnel descriptions and recording dates."