Vic Damone (5)

VIC DAMONE - LINGER AWHILE (1962)

1.Linger Awhile
2.Soft Lights and Sweet Music
3.Close Your Eyes
4.Deep Night
5.Stella by Starlight
6.One Love
7.Let's Face the Music and Dance
8.After the Lights Go Down Low
9.Change Partners
10.There! I've Said It Again
11.In the Still of the Night
12.When Lights Are Low

Vic Damone's first album for Capitol Records is also one of his best. Capitol brought Damone onboard to take the place of the defecting Frank Sinatra, so it shouldn't be much of a surprise that Linger Awhile With Vic Damone is essentially a mid-tempo bedroom swinger that falls somewhere between Sinatra's trendsetting Songs for Swingin' Lovers! and his slow-dance burner Nice 'N' Easy. Thankfully, the album itself is good enough that it can be enjoyed on its own terms. Damone's voice is as beautiful as ever and he finds a nice balance between intimate romance and winking good humor. Likewise, the underrated arranger and guitarist Jack Marshall perfectly combines elements of both Nelson Riddle and Billy May's charts for Sinatra into a satisfying whole, though he throws in plenty of jazz guitar. The song selection is a bright mix of standards and less-familiar fare, the highlight being the boudoir romp "After the Lights Go Down Low," which, along with the album cover, lets listeners know that the album is really geared toward amorous conquests and romantic evenings at home. That's where the comparisons between Vic Damone and Frank Sinatra end, as Damone rarely shows the interpretive depth or personal introspection that Sinatra brings to similar material. If this is what stopped Vic Damone from being ranked with the top echelon of truly great 20th century vocalists, Damone's talents are never in doubt and it also ensures that this album is a whole lot of fun. So while even "upbeat" Sinatra albums such as Nice 'N' Easy or A Swingin' Affair! brim over with regret and pain, Linger Awhile With Vic Damone is what you'll want to put on to set the stage for a romantic evening. This album has been released on CD on a budget EMI two-for-one release with the similar My Baby Loves to Swing. ~ Nick Dedina, Rovi

VIC DAMONE - Sings / Closer Than A Kiss (1985)

Vic Damone Sings:

1. Out Of Nowhere
2. The Night Has A Thousand Eyes
3. Ooooh, My Love
4. You Stepped Out Of A Dream
5. I Cried For You
6. Spring Is Here
7. Deep Purple
8. Toot, Toot, Tootsie
9. Swingin' Down The Lane
10.I Got It Bad

Closer Than A Kiss:

1. Closer Than A Kiss
2. I Kiss Your Hand, Madame
3. We Kiss In A Shadow
4. Cuddle Up A Little Closer
5. A Toujours
6. You And The Night And The Music
7. Prelude To A Kiss
8. How Deep Is The Ocean
9. Day By Day
10.As Time Goes By
11.Close As Pages In A Book

I don't think this one has ever been issued on CD. Indeed, it is labelled as a promotional product. In any case, Vic Damone was one of the finest popular singers of the 50's and 60's , so good that his career was still moving along towards the end of the last century. Now 83 years old he still keeps in touch with fans. Damone had many hits and was respected by his peers. Sinatra once said he had " the best set of pipes in the business". The voice is warm, smooth and very romantic, with an ease often matched to a swinging beat This double album varies in sound quality; mostly good but a couple of tracks are a little muffled in the original studio production. It's a nice album to put on and to settle down with a glass of wine and a special person, though!

VIC DAMONE - ANGELA MIA (1959)

Angela Mia
Tell Me You're Mine (Per un Bacio d'Amor)
Arrivederci, Roma
Just Say I Love Her
Non Dimenticar
O Sole Mio
You're Breaking My Heart
Serenade in the Light
Luna Rossa
I Have But One Heart
Anema E Core
Tell Me That You Love Me

Based on the beautiful, if somewhat bizarre, cover shot, listeners may expect this to be one of the weirder Vic Damone albums ever released. The sleeve pictures a downcast but dapper Damone looking so melancholy that he doesn't seem to notice that he inhabits a surreal world of Roman columns, multi-colored tapestries, and sexy beatniks recast as Italian maidens. It truly looks like a still from a movie collaboration between Michelangelo Antonioni, Salvador Dali, and a cadre of Madison Avenue hacks. Alas, Vic Damone was a lot of things during the 1950s, but neither eccentric nor bizarre were among them. That's not to say Angela Mia is a bad record, just not a very exciting one — especially if you're expecting an Italianate musical recasting of Camus' The Stranger. What Angela Mia does offer is a button-down view of white ethnicity aimed at 1950s Italian Americans and open-minded WASPs who want to take a bedroom tour of Italy from the safety of the suburbs. Thankfully, Vic Damone is the right man for this job. Damone has a gorgeous voice, a true feeling for Italian standards, and while he comes from the same American mean streets that produced Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, he projects the kind of country-club cool that Boston bluebloods have to go to prep school to learn. Damone doesn't possess Dino's easy good humor or goofy charisma on these Italian standards, but he's got great pipes and an intimate, romantic feeling for the material. With Angela Mia, Damone creates a Technicolor Hollywood version of Italy brimming over with eternal summers, factory-produced lunchmeats, and the promise of statuesque sex goddesses. And while the Italian social realism of The Bicycle Thief may be more "artistically satisfying," the languorous dream world that Damone paints with Angela Mia isn't really such a bad place to spend 45 minutes.

Vic Damone - That Towering Feeling! (1956)

 

01 - You Stepped Out Of A Dream
02 - Wait Till You See Her
03 - Out Of Nowhere
04 - The Song Is You
05 - Spring Is Here
06 - Let’s Fall In Love
07 - (When Your Heart’s On Fire) Smoke Gets In Your Eyes
08 - Time On My Hands (You In My Arms)
09 - I’m Glad There Is You
10 - The Touch Of Your Lips
11 - All The Things You Are
12 - Cheek To Cheek


VIC DAMONE - STAY WITH ME (1966)

01 - Pretty Butterfly
02 - Meditation
03 - Once I Loved
04 - How Insensitive
05 - Girl from Ipanema
06 - You Are
07 - Stay with Me
08 - Someone to Light up my Fire
09 - Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars
10 - Shadow of your Smile
11 - Sinnig Sea
12 - Time for Love
13 - Flamingo