Tales From A Vintage Wardrobe

I'd Rather Go Blind

Etta James
(Jamesetta Hawkins)
25 January 1938 ~ 20 January 2012

I clearly remember the first time I heard this song...it changed my taste in music forever.  America's Top 40 suddenly sounded shallow and ridiculous to this teenager with a broken heart...goodnight Ms. James.

Timing

Rendezvous in Paris

Last (for now) in our series of fashionable vintage album covers:

1964
Rendezvous in Paris
featuring
Fontanna and his Orchestra

My thoughts:
I'm jealous.

Roaring 20s!

Roaring 20s
featuring
Billy Randolph and the High Hatters
 
Excerpt from back cover:

"But what of the music of this frantic and frentic era?  The songs were those of the flapper ... the one with the stockings rolled "below" the knee.  The hip flask ... and long cigarette-holder (for women had just started to smoke in public).  The songs of the era were bright and slightly fragile.  The melodies that depicted wild life on the campuses of America.  The songs from the smoke-filled cabarets of the major cities.  The spots where for a price, the most beautiful dancer in the show would bathe in a bowl of champagne...for the exotic enjoyment of the elite.  An era running full speed toward destruction.  Not knowing it.  But laughing and singing as they went..."

I pulled the album out of the cover and began to laugh~~it's candy apple red see-through vinyl....perfect!

Swing Fever!

1960
Swing Fever
featuring
Buddy Cole
at the Swinging Hammond Organ

My thoughts:

Boy can't help it.
That black purse was the inspiration for The Birkin bag.
Why men love back zip, slim fit capris with high heels.
Time to go on a diet.

 

Be There at Five

 

Conversational Music
Be There at Five
conducted by
Glenn Osser

Excerpt from back cover:

"The cocktail hour is the vine-clad bridge in the day of the active modern.  It separates and it connects the two distinct parts of the well-ordered life.  It is the hour to gently close the work-day when the world makes its demands upon the person; it opens those hours when the person may make his demands upon the world.  It is the bridge into the evening, into relaxation, into the world of intimates, into privacy...The cocktail hour is a time that every zestful modern owes to himself.  It is a time for discovery of new moods, of desires, sometimes of new people, an hour to pool the feelings of separate souls.  This, then is music for five o'clock until..."

I could not have said it better myself...despite the hint of chauvinism...I see two glasses on that table.

All The Things You Are...

1957
Stanley Applewaite 
plays
All the Things You Are
featuring the music of
Jerome Kerr

My thoughts:

I promise to never wear sweats again.
Time to start that arm exercise program.
No one looks that thin in white.
Of course "The Way You Look Tonight" is on this album.

Invitation...

Invitation
featuring
Peter Duchin
his Piano & Strings

My thoughts:

Who is spying on them through the key hole?
His haircut is perfect.
She looks slightly "under age"...
But her hair is fabulous.

Slumbertime...

 

1956
Slumbertime
by
The Three Suns

My thoughts:

Perfect music to listen to in bed on a Sunday morning.
Perfect vintage peignoir to wear in bed on a Sunday morning.
Perfect earrings to wear with peignoir in bed on a Sunday morning.
Perfect shade of red lipstick.
(Almost) perfect man opening the champagne.

Pink Champagne for Dancing...

Pink Champagne for Dancing
featuring
Lloyd Mumm and his Starlight Orchestra
 

Excerpt from the back cover:

"Come with me to the Starlight Roof.  Wasn't that the place - or a place like it - where you celebrated an engagement or an anniversary once?  Listen, and I'm sure you'll agree it could have been...midnight...a warm breeze blowing in from the lake...a flickering candle in the center of the table...and the sound of a cork as the waiter opens the champagne, pours it into the glasses and leaves it on the ice just as someone on the microphone says, "And now for your dancing pleasure, we proudly present Lloyd Mumm and his Starlight Roof Orchestra..."

My thoughts:

I don't think she can stand, much less do the champagne waltz.
I'd kill for those earrings.
I wonder if Lloyd Mumm is related to the champagne Mumms?
The excerpt, though hokey, is still romantic in a "that's how it used to be" kind of way.