In its matching up of Andy Williams titles for a two-fer release, Collectables Records has opted to combine Williams' spring 1972 album Love Theme From "The Godfather" with his spring 1974 album The Way We Were, skipping over his fall 1972 album Alone Again (Naturally) and his fall 1973 album Solitaire. (Those two are together on another disc.) The theory may have been that these two both had something to do with the movies while the two in between did not, but in fact all of these albums take the same approach, more or ...
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In its matching up of Andy Williams titles for a two-fer release, Collectables Records has opted to combine Williams' spring 1972 album Love Theme From "The Godfather" with his spring 1974 album The Way We Were, skipping over his fall 1972 album Alone Again (Naturally) and his fall 1973 album Solitaire. (Those two are together on another disc.) The theory may have been that these two both had something to do with the movies while the two in between did not, but in fact all of these albums take the same approach, more or less. That approach is to have Williams present his interpretations of songs from the pop charts of the period. As it happens, these two albums mark significant milestones for the singer, albeit of opposite sorts. Buoyed by the success of the title track, which was Williams' last Top 40 pop hit, Love Theme From "The Godfather" was his last significant seller, his final gold album. The Way We Were, on the other hand, was a commercial disaster, Williams' first LP to miss the Billboard chart entirely since he joined Columbia Records in 1961. (It did manage a few weeks in the Cash Box chart.) This is not to say, however, that one is better than the other; Williams' long-running commercial clout simply ran out in the early '70s as a new generation of pop fans emerged who wanted to hear the Carpenters sing their hit versions of "Hurting Each Other" and "I Won't Last a Day Without You" instead of Williams covering the same songs. Thirty years later, that doesn't matter much, and what listeners are left with are winning renditions of some of the early '70s' biggest hits. ~ William Ruhlmann, Rovi
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