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(reviewed by Kevin Baker)
This is almost as bad as reviewing Nine Days from the macho perspective...not only am I going for "sissy" music, I'm going for "hippie sissy" music...stop the insanity! Call 'em what you will, but these guys and gals could sing, and by sing I don't mean warble or shriek or scream. They SANG, and they did so beautifully. The way their voices just blend together in harmony is awesome. I'm more than a little proud to say I can actually keep up with that...it's a stretch, but I could do most of Denny or John's parts if I had to for some reason. Not that I'm bragging.
OK, enough gay-but-not-in-a-homosexual-manner banter, these folks had some major intrapersonal relationship problems. John dumped his wife and kids for Michelle, who was a flirt and apparently slept with everybody but Mama Cass, who was in love with Denny, who had an affair with Michelle, who became pregnant. However, John was the father, so everybody was happy...not really. It must have been miserable trying to work together by 1968 after two years of that stuff. It amazes me that people who were that screwed up could make such good music with the people who screwed them up. Figuratively and literally. By the way, Leah vaguely resembles Michelle Phillips. For the unenlightened, Leah is my object d'amour at the current time, and we have quite a screwy (but no literally so!) history that is too long and complicated to go into.
Before I make another lame joke or prattle on more about someone who 99.9% of you all wouldn't know from Eve, I think I'll just get to the songs. Basically, this is a compilation, and if it included another two or three songs, it would include about all the Mamas and Papas you could ever need. As it is, some of my personal favorites are left off, but that's ok. The opener is the much acclaimed California Dreamin', and 35 years after it's release, it's still a perfect pop song. Go figure. The following track is probably their hippiest, Go Where You Wanna Go. The title says it all really.
Then we have Monday Monday, ANOTHER perfect popsong, a Mama Cass-led take on a Beatles song, a very pretty version of Do You Wanna Dance, and yet another mega-hit in I Saw Again. Not quite a perfect popsong, but it comes darn close. They also cover The Turtles with You Baby, and it's good as well. Dancing Bear is a bit of an odd number, but the harmony singing is even better than usual, and that's saying something. They have another Cass-led ditty called Words Of Love, an achingly beautiful song called No Salt On Her Tail about the Phillips's heartbreaking marriage, a melancholy song called Look Through My Window, a cover of Dancing In The Street that I don't care for, the hit cover of the Shirelles' Dedicated To The One I Love, their autobiography Creeque Alley, an old jazz tune, an awful cover of Twist and Shout, a semi-psychedelic tune called Twelve Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon), a cover of My Girl, a song about all the turmoil of 1968, and finally Mama Cass's famous Dream A Little Dream Of Me.
This is a very balanced, even cd of pop classics. John Phillips was a master songwriter, and this is a must-have for anyone interested in the mid-60s music scene. By the way, I would add Straight Shooter, Got A Feeling, and Strange Young Girls to this collection, as well as deleting Twist And Shout. But do get this, unless you dislike harmony, pop, or good music in general. My rating---Hey, I'll give ya a choice. You can give it either a 9 or 10---it's your call, Nick! [Editor's note: I flipped a coin - it's a 9. Besides, 10's to compilations are too easy, IMHO. OK, I'll shut up now.]
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