French Latino

In 1962, Capitol Records, Dean Martin's former record label, and Reprise Records, his new one, were engaged in battle as the former issued his final recordings for it and the latter put out just-recorded material. (The skirmish was a sideshow to the larger war between the two companies over Frank Sinatra, who had founded Reprise even before completing his Capitol contract.) In the LP racks, Capitol struck first with Dino! Italian Love Songs in February, and the album became the singer's first to figure in the best-seller charts. Reprise followed with French Style in April. Cha-Cha De Amor, the last album Martin recorded for Capitol, appeared in early November, and three weeks later Reprise responded with Dino Latino…

Joe was an easy listening pop singer who died in the early eighties while still in his prime. This collection contains the best of his music from 1965 to 1979. Some of the songs are of French origin and it would appear from the credits that he co-wrote some of them. He sings one of the tracks here (The guitar don't lie) in English, although the other 45 tracks are all in French. Apart from the French songs, there are a number of other songs that he sings with French lyrics. It is clear from the titles that at least some of them have completely new lyrics rather than being translated from the original. I conclude this review with a list of some of the songs that might be familiar to you, to give you an idea of his range of material. Despite his easy listening style, the sources of the songs are diverse, including country and folk as well as mainstream pop songs.

Dean Martin's first album for pal Frank Sinatra's Reprise label was ignored at the time of its initial 1962 release, but it's one of his lighthearted best. As you'd imagine from the leering cover shot of Martin in a beret, French Style is a breezy and tongue-in-cheek but ultimately romantic collection of American standards about Paris and actual French favorites such as "La Vie en Rose." It would still be a couple of years until Martin would be a major seller for Reprise, but the material on the album is actually much better than his later MOR hits. Neal Hefti, the excellent big band arranger who helped craft Count Basie's streamlined "atomic" style, handles the lounge-y charts, but they're in a swank lounge style…