Frank Manell's Greatest Hit

Before I get to this week's record, I want to share that I have updated a posting from two weeks ago, in which I had somehow forgotten to add the label scans. That was especially important, as this was the first time I had shared a record on that label. They are there now. 

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you, Frank Manell: 

When I first played this record, I knew I wanted to feature it very soon in a post, but I also thought it was one of the many cases where a song-poem company mislabeled the artist on a 45. Because the record shows the performer to be Frank Manell, and I was sure the singer of this song was a woman. 

It wasn't until I listened to the flip side that I realized that Frank Manell was a male singer who possessed a very high tenor, sort of a song-poem Clyde McPhatter. 

Not only that, but the song ("Diamonds and Rubies") is bouncy, energetic and winning all the way around, as is Mr. Manell's vocal. I find this record pretty irresistible. The TPA folks again demonstrate that, unlike many of the other companies, they were well aware of the styles and trends in music, and made their records sound like the hits of the day, the day in this case being 1957. The guitar during the bridge, in particular, sounds like it was lifted from any number of early Elvis records. The weird drop out just before the sax solo (which is part of the record, and not a error made in digitizing) is the only flaw here.

So who was Frank Manell? Danged if I know. He is only listed on the AS/PMA website on one record - this one - and Discogs has one more listing, for the release immediately before this one ("Having a Gay Time"). Then he disappears into whatever ether he arrived from. But he surely left us better than we were before he arrived, because this is a wonderful record. 

Download: Frank Manell - Diamonds and Rubies

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Sadly, I cannot work up any enthusiasm whatsoever for the flip side, "My Treasures", a dirge of an arrangement which buries any charms that might have been from the words or the vocal. The song is 30 seconds longer than "Diamonds and Rubies", and seems five times as long. 

But I will say that Mr. Manell continues to impress with his vocal prowess, with the exception of a tendency to over-enunciate some words to the point of mispronunciation, much in the way Nat (King) Cole tended to do. 

Download: Frank Manell - My Treasures

Play:

HAPPY NEW YEAR, EVERYBODY!!!!