Harry Chapin - Gold Medal Collection
|
List Price: Our Price: $9.43 You Save: $9.49 (50%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $4.37 (click here) Category: Music CD See more new music releases 
|
|---|
Buy this Music CD at online store in your country
Canadian Music Store
Canadian Music Store
Free Music Notes for Gold Medal Collection
Free Music Review: Some good stuff, some really terrible stuff
Hit: 3 Stars
This is a real mixed bag. Some of Chapin's musical stories are very moving and dramatic. Others are trite and shallow. "Better Place to Be" may be the worst song ever recorded; it's totally naive, cheesy, and overwrought. The line where the waitress wishes she "wasn't so fat" had me in hysterics. It's a masterpiece of bad songwriting and could almost be taken as a Chapin parody. Not surprisingly, the best songs are the classics: Cat's in the Cradle, Taxi, and Tangled Up Puppet are really fantastic. That said, almost every song of Chapin's is completely overproduced as if he didn't trust his voice and guitar work to carry the song strongly enough on their own. Sappy orchestrations, choir voices, and all other means of overproduction dominate these songs. Look at what Paul Simon and Dylan were able to do with almost no studio musicians. Chapin is simply not in that league. Still, some old favorites are here, but you'll find yourself jumping around the CD to find them.Free Music Review: many live performances
Hit: 3 Stars
If you're looking for the studio version of W.O.L.D. save your money! You won't find it on this collection.Free Music Review: A Representative Anthology
Hit: 2 Stars
Harry Chapin wrote story songs. They were often about folks who were frightened, disappointed, confused, lonely and sad. Being all these things when I was a lad, these songs spoke to me and I really enjoyed them and Mr. Chapin. In a fit of nostalgia I got ahold of this cd and was sorely disappointed.
His lyrics are usually prolix, unfelicitous, stilted, and forced things that poorly serve the maudlin tales he wants to tell us. One of the worst is Mr. Tanner, the tale of a man who lives for his singing, but quits when someone says something mean to him. I sure do feel sorry for him, but not in the way that Chapin wants me to. I'd expect this sort of thing from a teenager, but not from a grown man -- Harry or Mr. Tanner. Aside from "Cat's in the Cradle" and "Circle," most of his songs are dreadful.
The music is ok at best, as is the singing.
I liked the spoken tracks best, because these show Harry Chapin as the good man he was and his commitment to doing good things.
Free Music Review: Disappointed
Hit: 2 Stars
I know I didn't spend a lot but the CD's were scratchy,and even got stuck. Really, should have been labelled poor not good.