"bobby Darin"

Give a pair of medals and hefty raises to the two fellows at Atlantic who thought of pairing Bobby Darin – then 24 – and Johnny Mercer – then 51 – and backing them with the charts of Billy May. These two singer/songwriters, occupying opposite poles of a yawning generation gap, take some often hoary old Tin Pan Alley tunes and kid and swing the hell out of them, with May providing the same kind of hard-swinging, sly-witted big-band backings that he gave to Sinatra.

This 2CD set anthologises Bobby Darin's singles releases between 1956-1962, and includes two rare-as-hens-teeth promo's, and a couple of equally rare UK-only B-sides. Darin was by far the classiest, most versatile singer of his era, and carved out parallel careers as an R&R singer, a teen idol and an interpreter/updater of show tunes, and what is now referred to as The Great American Songbook. 30 of the titles on this 64-track compilation were major US and/or UK chart records.