The Pop Side and even more!

The Pop Side was a request and comprises 25 tracks of Les' more pop (easy listening) sides.

The other two albums have been provided previously by yours truly but Scott has carried out some restoration work and would well be worth a download as alternate versions.

We should thank Scott not only for these albums but also because he carries out restoration of LP sources and also gives us some informative facts which I shall share with you:

Concerning Exotica Suite, this is from a stereo lp that I have done some slight sound restoration on.

Concerning Wild in the Streets, Les wrote 3 of the selections from the 1968 soundtrack which I have marked in their titles. This is from a stereo lp with some slight sound restoration applied.

The Pop Side is a cd rip. It contains many Capitol singles from 1951 – 1956, some were on albums and some were only released as singles.

Links are you know where.

Even more titles - soundtracks

Here's even more stuff courtesy of Scott. Soundtracks this time and these are the most complete versions around. For the All the Loving Couples album Casanova is Les under a pseudonym.

As advised by Scott the following info for the Master of the World album is provided:

"Tracks 1 - 7 Suite from the Original Soundtrack (film version conducted by Les Baxter)

Tracks 8 - 19 Original 1961 Re-recorded album (Cal Carter conducting The "100" Men)

Tracks 1 - 19 Stereo version." There is a new link for this share as well as the original link.

The Goliath album has an interesting cover making it look like an exotica album. Its more light classical than exotica but there are some middle eastern influences and the music is quite exotic at times. There's even a track sub titled Noisy Village. Probably vies with Bora Bora as Les' best soundtrack album.

The film itself is an Italian sword and sandal epic starring Steve Reeves. It rates 5.1 stars on IMDB and it actually doesn't sound too bad.

When the feisty Cuban actress Chelo Alonso was slapped as part of the action she couldn't help slapping the male actor back until the Director tied her hands behind her back. After being untied she then went to where the other actor was and slapped him and told him "here's the change". What a gal! Personally I think she should have slapped the Director.

Its said that Reeves was offered the lead in Dr No and Fistful of Dollars and knocked them back. Probably because it meant he would have had to learn whole sentences.

Links in sidebar of course.

Les Baxter new batch

Kindly provided by Scott here's three more from the LB archives. Lost Episode and By Popular Request are from the TV special Les Baxter's Sounds of the 60s, fragments of which are on Youtube. They're live recordings so not studio standard but very interesting and I'd love to see a good copy of the special not the blurry low res samples on Youtube.

Probably the most interesting of the three is the Balladeers album which is basically a 60s folk hootenanny outing but well done and no, David Crosby is not included in the mix.

Les Baxter - Academy Award Winners - Soul of the Drums

Freshly ripped at 320kps by yours truly here's a truly odd coupling of one of Les' best exotica albums and one of his very good 'straight' recordings.

Les' didn't make many albums for Frank Sinatra's Reprise Records so maybe that's why these two ended up on the same CD.

Link

Les Baxter some more files

Some new files added to the list courtesy of Scott. Broadway '61 (a nice one), Million Seller Hits and Arthur Murray Waltzes (no cover).

A couple of links have died both soundtracks, Barbarian and House of Usher but I'll keep looking.

Les Baxter - The Singles

A correspondent has advised me that an interesting selection of Les' Capitol 45s has been compiled by this blog.

You can choose to download there or grab this edited version here.

I haven't changed the actual coding of 320kps MP3 but I have tidied up the tags and renamed the files to show the Capitol disc number for each track. I've also normalised the sound using Replay Gain but you of course need to use that to see any benefit.

The sound is very good in the brief listen I had and the music is more from ahem Les ' Romantic style (somebody didn't like me using the word schmaltz).

Track list

Capitol-1760 - Because Of You
Capitol-1966 - Blue Tango
Capitol-2106 - Lonely Wine
Capitol-2143 - Auf Wiederseh'n Sweetheart
Capitol-2374 - April In Portugal
Capitol-2457 - Ruby
Capitol-2479 - Gigi
Capitol 2479 - I Love Paris
Capitol-2845 - The High And The Mighty
Capitol-3055 - Medic
Capitol-3055 - Unchained Melody
Capitol-3120 - Wake The Town And Tell The People
Capitol-3291 - The Trouble With Harry
Capitol-3336 - The Poor People Of Paris
Capitol-3404 - Tango Of The Drums
Capitol-3404 - Sinner Man
Capitol-3526 - Giant
Capitol-3573 - The Left Arm Of Buddha