Village People - Best of
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Free Music Notes for Best of
Free Music Review: Awesome!!
Hit: 5 Stars
I love this album. It's fantastic. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys great music.Free Music Review: Village People... Fight For Your Right
Hit: 4 Stars
Producer Jacques Morali had a vision for a group that would speak out for the concerns and sensibilities of the (then) unsung Gay populace that was struggling to find a voice in the late 70s. Village People was the end product of that vision. Ads were taken out and actors were hired to play 6 arch-typical (or stereotypical) Gay male types; icons, if you will: A Soldier, A Biker, A Cop, A Construction Worker, A Cowboy, and An Indian. Four songs were constructed and made into an album: Village People. The songs celebrated four hotbeds of Gay male activity: San Francisco, Hollywood, Fire Island, and Greenwich Village. The songs were also trendsetting and funky, filling dance floors from coast to coast. This was the start of The Village People, and all four of those songs are included in this greatest hits package. That first album was really the creative zenith for the group. Lead singer Victor Willis soon took over as the lyricist for the guys, and he came up with a big, big song for the follow-up album. Macho Man gave The Village People their first crossover success, going top 10 on three charts. To me, it was their last song worth a damn, but the Macho Man album did so well, it was ripe to be cloned. And it was cloned not once, but twice, on the albums Cruisin' and Go West. Cruisin' contained the campy "Y.M.C.A.", which topped the charts and spawned the most ridiculous dance sensation since The Freddy! Go West had on it the cartoonish "In The Navy", which was picked up as a recruiting tool by the U.S. Navy, until it was explained to someone of high rank, just what it was about the Navy that The Village People were championing! After a great first album, The Village People's three follow-ups all had one big hit and a host of other songs that we'll magnanimously refer to as "filler." Nothing else they put out as a single ("Ready For The 80s" "Can't Stop The Music" etc.) was even close to beinga hit. But for what it's worth, the hits are here. And since the entire first album is, too, I give the whole thing four stars. If you didn't know that The Village People had a life before "Macho Man," then you need to check out tracks 4, 5, 9, and 11 on this CD. Knowing that this group once had a strong direction, a strong message and a strong groove, it was hard for me to see them commercialized and homogenized, and turned into (what amounts to): An all-male group of male impersonators that masquerades as itself. Can you dig it?
Free Music Review: The Twelve Inch Versions
Hit: 4 Stars
THE VILLAGE PEOPLE, of course, were not an organic band; they were deliberately created through a series of auditions and then costumed, choreographed, and unleashed in a collection of images that might have been dreamed up by gay erotic artist Tom of Finnland: muscular with theatrical costumes cut to show every possible bulge, voices that screamed with an excess of testosterone, and both unexpectedly combined with a bouncy beat. The result is a type of musical camp unlike anything heard before or since, and I'm still amazed that they got away with it.Given the somewhat flabbergasting nature of the band, its easy to overlook the music--but strange to say, given the homoerotic slant, their recordings remain a staple of everything from highschool proms to stadium sports events: fun, and funny, and excessive, and extremely memorable. The sound is aggressive, to say the least, and determinedly so, and all the hits are here, and all of it packed with as much unsubtle innuendo as possible. There's "YMCA," and who among us can't jump up and immediately do the contortions required to spell out the letters? Not to mention, of course, speculate on the impact the Village People might have had on that venerable organization. There's the notoriously homoerotic "Macho Man" and the infamous "In The Navy," which poses the musical question 'What am I going to do on a submarine?' Many of the more popular recordings are presented in what is described here as the 12" versions--and what more can we say about that? For the most part, each recording blends over into the next, so the whole thing plays like one long leather bar dance floor mix.
THE VILLAGE PEOPLE's music will never be accused of being great art, and their albums were essentially filler collected around a couple of big-sell recordings, so don't feel you're missing out on anything by not buying the original releases--this is the way to go. The perfect recording to liven up a cocktail party, beer bust, biker rally... lots of bass-pounding, wall-shaking fun!
Free Music Review: Very good set from one of disco's most popular groups
Hit: 4 Stars
Although their prime was relatively brief, the Village People is still one of the first names mentioned when the disco era is discussed. Despite having no musical talent (with the exception of lead vocalist Victor Willis), the Village People would gain a great deal of fame through their visual presence while performing songs co-written by their visionary producer Jacques Morali and several professional songwriters. In retrospect, their story isn't much different from the New Kids on the Block who would become much bigger stars a decade later. However, while the New Kids on the Block's big hits have largely become forgotten, the Village People's big hits have aged quite well. Their undeniable high point is "Y.M.C.A.", which is not only one of the biggest hits of the disco era but remains a favorite in both the dance clubs and weddings nearly 30 years later. The big hits "Macho Man" and "In the Navy" possess memorable choruses, catchy hooks, and killer bass lines and still sound great. The lesser known tracks "San Francisco (You've Got Me)", "In Hollywood (Everybody Is a Star)", and "Key West" are all very funky and on the level of their hit singles. The quality drops noticeably after this as the songs range from decent ("Fire Island, "Can't Stop the Music", "Village People") to mediocre ("Go West", "Hot Cop"). Also worth noting is that listening to the album in its entirety can become a chore since most of the songs begin with a drum beat in the same exact tempo. All told, The Best of Village People is a good compilation of one of the most popular disco groups of the 1970's. Highly recommended to fans of the disco years.Free Music Review: Party on a platter!
Hit: 4 Stars
If the Casablanca record label was the Monarchy of the Disco Nation, The Village People were their finest ambassadors. More than any of the prefabricated disco machines that the decade produced, it is the VP's cavity provoking bubble-gum dance records that made strobe lights and disco balls accessible and acceptable to party people of all stripes. Add in the undeniable fact that the innuendo laden singles and their stereotyped get-ups made gay subculture visible and you can actually add the term "culturally significant" to the Village People's list of accomplishments.But all that pales when placed next to the vibrancy of this solid collection of 12 inch singles and dance mixes. Like all of the best dance floor confectionary creampuffs, the songs here convey a kooky innocence (the Navy had to let in on the joke before they backed off their decision to use "In The Navy" as a recruitment jingle) that remains timeless. And in the post-AIDS decades, the more obvious 70's call to the disenfranchised like "Go West," "San Francisco" and "In Hollywood" are even poignant.
Deny it if you dare, but secretly you know this stuff is great. Just see if your limbs don't start contorting into the alphabet next time "YMCA" gets played on some football arena PA or at your next company party. I double dog dare ya.