Tom Moon on Phil Spector

"Whenever you hear a '60s-era production with echoey voices, five or six guitar parts, nearly as many keyboards, and perfectly aligned maracas and other percussion shaking and rattling underneath, it's safe to assume that the enigmatic Spector created it, or inspired it. The Bronx-born, L.A.-based multi-instrumentalist revolutionized record production with his elaborate multitracking, which became immortally known as the 'Wall of Sound.' … His break came in 1960, when some L.A. producers he'd been apprenticing with sent him to New York to work with the songwriting team of Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller. Spector hit it off with the pair right away, co-writing 'Spanish Harlem' with Leiber. … Spector formed his first record company in 1961. … Over the next three years, Spector was responsible for twenty successive smash hits, from the Crystals' 'Da Doo Ron Ron' to the Ronettes' 'Be My Baby' to Darlene Love's 'Chapel of Love' to the Righteous Brothers' 'You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'.' These and many more towering productions are collected in the chronologically arranged mega-anthology Back to Mono" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, pp. 728-729).

Tom Moon on Frank Sinatra

"Honoring Sinatra with a Grammy Legend Award in 1994, U2 lead singer Bono described the singer's gift this way: 'Comin' through with the big stick, the aside, the quiet compliment, good cop/bad cop all in the same breath.' Songs for Swingin' Lovers is one of the best showcases for that dizzying sequence of uppercuts and jabs, in which unbridled cocksure exuberance is followed by moments of anguished soul-searching. It's among the early collaborations between Sinatra and arranger Nelson Riddle, and it shows how even when the rhythms are designed to not rattle the china, Sinatra somehow rattles the soul. On chart after ambling chart, each one decorated with a slightly different set of studio-orchestra colors, the Chairman of the Board demonstrates all the little ways exacting placement and phrasing can light up the room. His lines fall fitfully against the pattering rhythms. Or they glide along, gently increasing altitude, helped aloft by trembling strings. Or … his phrases are steeped in a besotted, lovestruck haze. No other American singer entertained this way, in sly bursts that formed their own iconographic musical language" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, pp. 706-707).

Tom Moon on Nina Simone

"In the song-drama 'Four Women,' one of several Nina Simone originals on this career overview released shortly after she died in 2003, at age seventy, the classically trained pianist and singer assumes the identities of four black female archetypes—the wise, long-suffering laborer, the whore, the militant, and the confused child of mixed-race parents. Each is distinct, stepping out of a different period novel. Through changes in inflection and dialect, Simone forces her listeners to confront those characters, feel their humanity, sense their struggles. By the time the song ends, you know about more than just four isolated women; you know about womanhood and pride, dignity and the tangled politics of identity and race. It's always that way with Simone. … She rarely throws herself completely into extremes like 'happy' or 'sad'—here is complex music in the key of bittersweet, complete with the messier aspects that jazz divas sometimes gloss over. Her love songs, like the wrenching 'I Loves You Porgy,' have the weary, worn-down countenance of the soldier returning from violent battle; her protest songs … are delivered with a romantic's blue-sky idealism" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, p. 705).

Tom Moon on Ma Rainey

"Ma Rainey comes through louder and clearer than any other blues singer of the 1920s. Though her recordings have the staticky veneer that plagues everything from the era, Rainey somehow pierces the noise. A veteran who'd been belting for more than twenty years before her voice was captured for posterity, she dispenses risqué notions and wronged-woman blues with wry and worldly inflections, a mixture of growls and shouts that just about everyone after her copied. Rainey (1886-1939) matters because she was among the first blues artists to develop more than a regional following: Through grueling roadwork as a part of circuses and minstrel shows, she and her husband … became well-known performers throughout the South. This made Ma Rainey a powerful influence: Bessie Smith, the so-called Queen of the Blues, heard (and openly imitated) Rainey. … Rainey is also significant because of the joy on display here. … Her tunes recorded between 1924 and 1928 are distinguished by a cheeky irreverence and great spirit. Her big voice bellowing, she … enjoys the double-entendre talk about her 'Black Bottom'—which, of course, is a dance" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, pp. 628-629).

Tom Moon on Puccini

"Giacomo Puccini's last opera is the story of a frigid princess who beheads suitors who can't answer her three riddles. The plot is ghastly at times; the title character a nasty tyrant. And yet Turandot contains some of the most sweepingly lyrical, arrestingly beautiful music in all of opera. … The title character typically had been played by Wagnerites, singers prone to oversized delivery. [Joan] Sutherland wasn't that—her calling card was finesse. Somehow, though, conductor Zubin Mehta draws an almost animalistic, instinct-driven performance from her. The entire work feels shot full of energy—Mehta gets the singers to attend to the specifics without neglecting the motives (and warped mores) of their characters. Puccini didn't finish Turandot, which some have speculated drew on his own experience (his wife was known to be a cold, jealous type). He had trouble with the resolution of the story, the moment in the third act when Turandot realizes her meanness and becomes a good wife to Calaf. He'd orchestrated the entire work, and made numerous attempts at endings, but was stymied by the final scenes. The opera was finished by Franco Alfano. …" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, pp. 620-621).

Tom Moon on "My Fair Lady"

"Most original-cast albums of the 1950s were recorded in a single day. Producers tried to schedule the sessions as close to the opening of the musical as possible, thinking that the nuances of the work would be fresh in the performers' minds. That strategy sometimes backfired. The frenzy of getting a show off the ground meant performers hadn't yet settled into the songs. And were often exhausted besides. Amazingly, there's no fatigue in the zippy readings of this Lerner and Loewe masterpiece, which was recorded in one marathon fourteen-hour session on March 25, 1956. … The show yielded an astounding number of songs that became standards. … [Rex] Harrison, as Henry Higgins, enjoys every wink of his ironies: When he describes himself, in 'I'm an Ordinary Man,' his exaggerated demeanor suggests his character is anything but ordinary. That Harrison caught this specific dynamic so early in what became a historic extended run is remarkable. In a vivid illustration of how precarious these inflections can be, by the time of the 1959 London cast recording, he lost that gleam—he's no longer in on the joke—making the iridescent 1956 version the clear choice" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, p. 447).

Tom Moon on Whitney Houston

"It's not often that a record designed down to the last breath to be commercially accessible ends up changing the rules. Whitney Houston's debut did exactly that. Discovered and launched by legendary record executive Clive Davis, Houston came out of nowhere in early 1985, and within two years virtually everything on urban radio sounded like an echo of this album—producers shamelessly borrowed the beats, the string sounds, and the plush padded keyboards, while a school of singers (Toni Braxton, the members of TLC, Janet Jackson) emulated Houston's writhing phrases and demanding-diva delivery. Houston was, to be sure, something special. The daughter of gospel dynamo Cissy Houston, she grew up in Newark, New Jersey, singing in church. Her early career included jingle dates and appearances in clubs—her first recording was with producer Bill Laswell's experimental rock band Material. From the start, Houston had an unusual combination of skills: the timing of a jazz singer and the range … of a gospel soloist. This enchanted Davis, who spotted her one night when she was singing in a club [and] offered her a contract on the spot …" (1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die, p. 370).