[Frames] | [No Frames]
Various Artists
Lounge-A-Palooza
[Hollywood]
Rating: 4.8
Ah, lounge music. The Ultimate Craze of 1996. Yeah, you remember the
parties -- hanging out at a pal's swinger's pad, drinking martinis,
chatting about the weather, Dean
Martin on the hi-fi. It was fun for
like a minute, but in retrospect, you just feel stupid.
Enter Lounge-A-Palooza, a lounge compilation of another kind.
Your favorite grungers and indie rockers performing the lounge tunes
of their choice -- and they aren't all originally lounge tunes. Sound
kitschy? Tounge-in-cheek overdrive, baby. You'll listen through (or
maybe you won't) 14 hep tracks from today's hottest artists like
Ben Folds Five
(covering the Flaming
Lips' "She Don't Use Jelly"), Pizzicato
Five ("The Girl From Ipanema"), and Jimmy
Scott and Flea
("Love Will Keep Us Together"), among others.
Hey, think what you want. This comp is either for you or it's not.
Mostly, I like it 'cause it's an interesting listen. You're not really
sure how Polly
Jean Harvey and Eric
Drew Feldman will sound covering
Was
(Not Was)' cult fave "Zaz Turned Blue" or how
Edwyn
Collins is
going to pull off "Witchcraft," the old standard made famous by
Frank
Sinatra, but most of these songs come out rather listenable. Sure,
you're gonna wanna avoid a few of these tracks.
Steve
and Eydie do
Soundgarden's
"Black Hole Sun" with a 32-piece orchestra, while Poe
perform an original piece called "A Rose Is A Rose," and they're
both pretty abyssmal.
Lounge-A-Palooza is a good listen once or twice and there's
some decent mix tape fodder here, but overall, it's far from classic.
-Ryan Schreiber