The New Broadway Cast Recording - Hair (The New Broadway Cast Recording)
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Free Music Notes for Hair (The New Broadway Cast Recording)
Free Music Review: ELECTRIFYING
Hit: 5 Stars
I bought this a few months ago and saw the show in October. It's spectacular. I can't describe it any other way.Free Music Review: Hippie music that truly rocks.
Hit: 5 Stars
Takes me back to that special trip my mom and I took to NYC just to see it every time. Absolutely amazing!Free Music Review: The MESSAGE is the focus of the new recording.
Hit: 4 Stars
I always had a problem with the original 1968 Broadway cast recording. A lot of the singing -- including that done by the so-called professionals -- is bad. The music was rather limp. And overall, the album sounded like any other show's cast recording. It didn't sound like rock music, despite being called a rock musical. I later found out from people involved that there was a good reason: the album was rush-recorded, and cast members were pulled out of rehearsal with no notice to run in and overdub their vocals. As a result, the recording didn't have the oomph that would appear on subsequent albums recorded by the original Broadway cast, such as DisinHAIRited and Divine Hair/Mass in F, both of which do have a rock vibe.
The new Broadway album, though, has a highly unusual vibe to it. First, let me just say that I saw the show in July, and it was fantastic. One thing that really drove the show: the music as performed by the band, especially with Bernard Purdie's spirited drumming. But when you listen to the cast recording, you'll find that the feel is very subdued -- the band seems to be mixed in the background, as if they didn't want to wake the baby. Really, it sounds very mellow -- the exact opposite of how the music sounds if you go to the Al Hirschfeld Theater. I'm not saying it's BAD. In fact, in a way, it's good. Let me explain.
If you ever read the paperback book of Hair that came out in 1969 (it's an amalgam of the off-Broadway and Broadway scripts), the notations emphasize how important it is that the audience hear the lyrics. Well, when you listen to the new Broadway cast recording, it becomes apparent that the producers of the album want us to hear the lyrics and, therefore, the message. My wife even commented that for the first time, she could understand the lyrics to songs she could never make out before, in particular "Walking In Space." Some of the more raucous songs, particularly "Ain't Got No Grass" and "Electric Blues," sound like they may have even been slowed down to make the lyrics more intelligible -- indeed, of the dozen or so different cast recordings I've heard, this is the first one in which I could actually tell what the lyrics to "Electric Blues" were just by listening.
So that's what's going on here: the lyrics, the message, are the emphasis more so than the music. If you haven't seen the revival on stage, you might be a bit put off by this recording and think that Hair has gone mellow -- but take it from someone who recently saw the new production: it definitely has NOT. It's just that the band is laid back in the recording (they're definitely not on stage!) to give the message of Hair a little more focus.
Free Music Review: Great Recording, fills alot of gaps
Hit: 4 Stars
Back in the late 60's I wore out the grooves on my Original Cast recording of "Hair" and still remember it fondly. The reality is that recorded back in the age of LP's, my beloved record probably included about 30% of the music actually heard in the show. This recording corrects that. There is at least 60% more music on the new CD. As to the quality? The recording is cleaner. By this I mean that whereas the old recording had a rather rough and ready quality (and rather rough and ready performers), this recording was made with tender-loving care and all the perks that modern recoding has to offer. Also a more professional sounding cast. Yes, you do loose some of the spontenaity and raw energy of the original but the vocal and instrumental parts are MUCH cleaner. If there was some vocal or instrumental line you heard back in the 60's that didn't seem quite clear to you, this recording will make it clear. In sum, it's a very worthy successor and companion piece to the original recording. I highly recommend it.Free Music Review: Hair, the revival
Hit: 4 Stars
When Hair first appeared in 1968 it was seen as a social statement and not fully viewed as a Broadway musical filled with great musical numbers. It made political statements, racial statements, and religious statements. It addressed the use of re recreational drugs, especially marijuana, in talked about inter-racial sex and it presented the entire cast on stage, completely nude. The trauma of 1968, including the assassinations of Robert Kennedy and Dr Martin Luther King, the war in Vietnam, the Hippy Movement and the Chicago Democratic Convention only added to the mystic that became Hair.
This time around Hair is a musical period piece, the social statements have little meaning except to those who were around in the sixties, but the music has been reborn as a gift to a new generation.
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