So I stopped checking for blogs after a few weeks, since the BD blog-compulsion had become almost masturbatory....what with Kylie travelling, Derek daddying, Marc remaining strong/silent, and Stuart sticking to his strength as a blog-counterpuncher, well, I was tired of blogging with myself. But anyhoo, glad to see some life in the old girl yet (am I mixing metaphors?).

And Derek - since reading your blog, I've been racking my brains trying to remember when you and I saw Anita O'Day sing in the past six months :) (and it hasn't come to me....so are you sure she's dead?)

I will chime in on the raging Joanne Newsome debate with a strong "no thanks", based on the few samples I've done, and let one of you (Stuart, it sounds like) convince me of the error of my ways.

And today I get to blog on Anita and The Zombies. fun fun fun.....

Anita O'Day is my favourite jazz singer - her voice the perfect mix of scratchy world weariness ala Billie Holiday, tongue-in-cheek-we-all-know-this-is-just-a-song jazz irony, and, yet, heartbreaking, soul-searching sadness. Doesn't have the pipes of say, Sarah Vaughan or Ella, or the come-hither sexiness of Helen Merrill or June Christy....more of a blend of the above, and still unique and utterly unmistakeable. If you haven't spent any time with her music, you've kinda got to (sorry, you have no choice). I have a number of her recordings, mostly from the mid-late fifties. My favourite is her stripped-down session with the Oscar Peterson trio called "Anita Sings the Most". Much of the rest of her ouevre is working with medium to large bands, all of which is good, and some fantastic. Of these, I would go with This is Anita, AOD Sings the Winners, and Pick Yourself Up, all released within a few years of each other.

Re the Zombies, true enough there is really only one album, Odessey and Oracle, in my view one of the top three or four pop records of all time. It's been described as "the Zombies' Pet Sounds", but I think it makes mince meat out of Pet Sounds. The quality and variety of song, and the beauty of their performance are extraordinary throughout. The Zombies were an anomaly - way too sophisticated to be lumped in with the other British Invasion pop bands of the 64/65 timeframe with their strong jazz influences combined with choral harmonies and incredible melodies (not to mention interesting lyrics), but that's where they ended up. The band didn't last long as a result, record companies looking for hits that they couldn't hear, and broke up in '67, just after the release of Odessey and Oracle. The album wasn't released in the States until a year later, and Time of the Season didn't chart until almost two years after their demise. Anyway, buy it, full stop, and then we'll talk some more.

However, by only picking up that record you're missing out on some great songs (incl Tell Her No and She's Not There), which would best be found on one of the numerous singles compilations out there. Those of us who like Belle and Sebastien will hear clear influences in the Z's earlier material, with Colin Blunstone's breathy vocals, simpler arrangements then on O&O, and often that groovy jazz compositional underpinning. These are some of the best songs coming our of Britain in the mid 60's in my opinion, still way underheard and underappreciated. My faves include Smokey Day, Whenever You're Ready, Is this the Dream, If it Don't Work Out, I Love You, You Make Me Feel Good, Imagine the Swan.