The Burt Bacharach Discussion Forum

I bought the album tonight and have listened to it about 3 times already. I absolutly love it.

I have been really disturbed that the post titled "Screw you Burt" has had so many hits. And more disturbed at some of the mud slinging. So the man has something strong to say after 77 years. Good for him. I have met Burt and his son Oliver. I think he has reason to worry about his childrens' futures in this world. From reading the interviews he has given lately, he almost seems depressed.

By the way, when I purchased the CD, I also bought the book "Do as I say not as I do-Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy" Doesn't get much more republican that me. So I disagree with him politically. But musically...this is one of his best yet.

I popped in the CD and started making dinner. When I heard the first few lines of "Who Are These People" it sounded like it should have been on Painted from Memory. I didn't know this was the Elvis Costello song. It sounded like a song they could have put on their previous album. EC and BB certainly have a distinct sound together. They fit well together. "Dreams" has that same sound. Just fabulous. and "Can't Give Up" was a nice surprise.

The CD sounds more sexy to me that political. Musically, at least. The horns and violins and piano are all so lovely. How does he do this? And it is always wonderful to hear him sing his own music-I don't care if he may not have the strongest voice in the world. It's like hearing Shakspeare read his own plays. There is nothing like an artist preforming his own work. Which is why seeing him live is so wonderful. I have read Burt's latest interviews and certainly see (or hear) his tension with the world generally and the with Bush specifically. I still love the man and his music. This is the person who told me that when I walk let my heart lead the way-or at least the music to go along with it. As far as I am concerned, here I am and here I'll stay.

I too love the new music Burt has made; from beginning to end, it holds together extremely well as an "at this point and time" concept album. The lyrics are appropriately simplistic and poignant, and the music is some of the finest Burt has ever composed--maybe, in fact, the best instrumental music he has ever written.

I imagine Burt had Miles in mind on some of the passages for muted trumpet. On "Who Are These People," I think Burt may have actually tried to write it as if Elvis himself would have. Clearly he had EC in mind to handle the lead vocal.

The strings are lovely throughout the record; some are very haunting and come at you from left field. "Danger"--a real high point on Side 2--plays like something has gone terribly wrong on Pacific Coast Highway. This is some of the most dissonant and haunting music written in my lifetime.

Burt made a nice choice in Wainwright to handle the vocal on "Go Ask Shakespeare." It's a plaintive song that requires a voice in kind. Nicely done, guys.

I love this album; I've been playing it non-stop. Thanks, Burt, and congratulations. You've really done yourself proud on At This Time.

I can't stop playing the CD either (I bought it at Tower Records on the day Tower Records got it!). It's pure Bacharach genius. His music and orchestrations have taken me places where no other composer can take me. It's always been that way with him. His ability to write fantastically creative and unique melodies and harmonies remain undiminished by time. There isn't one bad note on the whole CD and that Bacharach touch is in full bloom yet once again. And sad to say, it does remind me of all the years that have gone by without Burt putting out music for us to love and enjoy. The whole recording industry should be ashamed of themselves for not supporting this genius. It took someone like Rob Stringer to figure this out, I guess.

Now, I'm in eager anticipation of the sheet music for At This Time to come out, so I can fully enjoy playing the music myself. I've always lived for this!

I'm not a "cool jazz" listener, but it seems to me that Can't Give It Up would be a natural for the format. Has anyone heard this song (or any others) on radio? Also, on about my third listen of Go Ask Shakespeare, it occurred to me that Rufus's voice sounds eerily similar to Billy Joel's circa 1974. Admittedly, Billy was always more of a belter, but nevertheless, I hear a definite similarity. I'd be surprised if the comparison hasn't been made before elsewhere. Lastly, someone mentioned that ATT sounds like a movie score. I certainly would agree with that. With talk of Newman and Redford making one final movie together, I think it would be awfully fitting if Burt scored that film and there was a grand reunion of these great men of celluloid and song. And even if Burt didn't work on that particular project, I would hope that in the wake of ATT, producers would begin to seek out Burt's services more than they have in recent years for movie soundtracks (assuming that's the case and not just that Burt hasn't had a desire to work on more films).

I am a big fan of burt bacharach but was so dissapointed to find that his New cd AT THIS TIME has some kind of copywrite protection. I cant play it on my computer and i have windows media and sony player software. I take it that music companies must want us to download music now. Which is something i dont want to do. But I do want copy to my mp3 player for my own personal use. Unfortunately my cd went back to the shop. I hope more people do this in future.

Any advice on how i can over come this problem would be much appreciated!!

still love At This Time after a couple of weeks of listening and after reading a couple of warm-received reviews. And even after that strange Stewart Smally/SNL/Tavis Smiley interview.

Any thoughts as to what you all thought of that guy (not Burt-we all love him!) This Tavis guy-just made me angry...

Just wondering who watched it and what you thought-not only of Burt, but of the show in general.

I always liked Tavis when he was on NPR. What was wrong with him?

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Friday November 11th 2005
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Maybe the poster was referring to the Village Voice review?
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Tavis: Glad to have you on this program. Up next on this program, composer Burt Bacharach. Stay with us.


Burt Bacharach
Learn more about this guest.
Tavis: The numbers may speak for themselves and indeed they do. Forty-eight top ten hits, nine number one, six Grammies and three Oscars, but it's the songs that tell the real genius of Burt Bacharach. Songs with and for artists like Dionne Warwick, The Drifters, Hal David and even Elvis Costello and Dr. Dre. That's right. Dr. Dre. His body of work in an American songbook rivaled by few in the music industry, this fall he's out with his first solo CD in fifteen years. The disc is called "At This Time" and it's been receiving some terrific reviews. Burt Bacharach, nice to meet you.

Burt Bacharach: Thank you, Tavis.

Tavis: Glad to have you on the program.

Bacharach: Thanks for having me, Tavis.

Tavis: I was about to ask why you even feel the need to do something like this after all those numbers and all that you've done, but I know the answer. I saw a quote from you the other day when you said that, "I hate what's going on in the world right now and I wanted to say something about it."

Bacharach: Had to.

Tavis: So what do you hate about what is going on in the world?

Bacharach: Well, the way I would say it, you know, is I'm not going to get on stage during a concert and go after anybody or say anything. I will say it through my music. And being able to write this music, because I thought that I had the capacity to express -- I mean, ever since 9/11, I guess it's been growing inside me. You know, I've got a nine year old and a twelve year old and a nineteen year old. How much that had to do, how much that contributed to what I'm feeling, you know, and what I felt.

Hey, I was totally pro-war. I mean, going into Iraq, not pro-war, but pro. When Colin Powell and the U.N. said weapons of mass destruction, I say, yeah, got to do it, got to do it. Then to find out that it all started to unravel and misinformation and shaping of material and I'm just writing. From December on, I started with some of the great drum loops of Dr. Dre. I had never found the need in all these years to make another solo album. I'm not a singer. I sing a little bit in this album, like a song and a quarter, but they were meaningful because it's the first time I've ever written lyrics. So I co-wrote the lyrics with Tonio K. and the music kind of spilled out, Tavis, with the words. The words shaped themselves.

You know, there are no songs here that start an intro, the singer starts and then there's an ending. There are like interjections, vocal interjections, interruptions. Somebody comes in with a statement, like a Greek chorus. It's not intended. But it all happened as things kept getting worse, I would say, from December on and I would watch John Stewart, I would watch Aaron Brown and get ready for bed and get more depressed with the rising numbers coming out of Iraq. You know, so many areas of dissatisfaction. You could have me on for two hours and I could --

Tavis: -- let me jump in right quick because you said three or four things here that I want to follow up on. First of all, the fact that you have two young children. Tell me how that has impacted -- I don't want to slide over this. Let me go back and get two or three other right quick -- the fact that you have young children. How has that impacted your work today? We know what you did yesterday and the day before that and the day before that. How has being a father to young children in today's world impacted your work and your writing now?

Bacharach: Well, you know, to have a second family, or a third family, you might say, at this point in my life, at this time in my life, is very kind of out of the ordinary, you know. But having two young lives in the house, I love these kids. Having the time for them and having compassion, to have two beautiful kids in my life. My nineteen year old is going to be twenty soon. I'm very close to him, but it's not like these two kids in the house. What is this like? I worry about them. I worry about them all the time. Your kids, my kids, everybody's kids. I dedicate the album to my kids and your kids.

Tavis: You mention Dr. Dre and some drum beats that Dre provided for you. That sounds like oxymoronic to people right now. Dr. Dre and Burt Bacharach. Dr. Dre and Burt Bacharach. How did that happen?

Bacharach: Well, Dre wanted to meet me and I wanted to meet him. You know, he was thinking about starting his solo album which would be last album three years ago. We met through a mutual friend and Dre gave me about seven or eight drum loops and said, "See what you come up with." Well, he never got around to starting his album until the summer, so I continued on and I played them for Dre and he liked them. He kind of gave me his blessings and I then started with the idea of putting real strings, a real orchestra, over these Dre drum loops because they're brilliant.

It's very hard to write that way because it's four bars and the next four bars are the same as the first four bars, just about. There were the restrictions because it is a little restrictive, but writing music over when there's much angular movement in the strings and trying to say something lyrically and musically. So there is a constant all the way through the album. It just evolves. And probably it reached its peak maybe in the centerfold of the album in the piece that's called "Who Are These People?" That's pretty severe.

Tavis: Speaking of "Who Are These People?", this is the Elvis Costello piece that got you in some trouble, I hear. Because there was a particular word that we don't say here on PBS that was in the song that the folks at the record label -- who is this -- this is Columbia.

Bacharach: And they're right.

Tavis: Yeah, the folks on the label wanted you to cut this word out and you guys had some conversation about it back and forth. The word eventually comes out. Had the word stayed in, it would have required a parental label on a Burt Bacharach project (laughter) which is funny to me. I can't imagine Burt Bacharach -- a Dr. Dre project, yes. Not a Burt Bacharach project. Anyway, the word comes out, but this is the piece that Elvis Costello does on the CD.

Bacharach: Yeah, Elvis makes his entrance like a cleanup hitter. He's the third singer on that particular piece. He comes in with "This stupid mess we're in just keeps getting worse. So many people dying needlessly. Looks like these liars may inherit the earth in pretending to pray and getting away with it." So Elvis just kind of makes the last chorus with these people who keep telling us lies. How do these people get control of our lives?

Tavis: Has Burt Bacharach always been this political? I mean, this project is -- I don't remember this in "Walk On By" and "A House Is Not A Home". I don't remember nothing about liars and bad words.

Bacharach: You know what it is, Tavis? There is a writer -- you know, two writers came up with pretty good quotes in interviews. One was, you know, all your life you write love songs. Never rocked the boat. You've been writing love songs and you're still writing love songs with this because the love songs you wrote always were like "Anyone Who Had A Heart", about breaking up relationships, and you're writing love songs here except it's not for a person, it's for people, for many, many people whose hearts are getting broken.

Tavis: You mention these two young kids you got. Do they have any sense of who their dad is in terms of what his contribution to music has been? Do they get that at this point?

Bacharach: Yes, they do.

Tavis: They do?

Bacharach: Yeah, they come to concerts. I bring them on stage once in a while. They sit in the audience. Whether I'm doing a symphony or a tour in Las Vegas, they get it. To what extent, maybe. Oliver is twelve. More than Raleigh. He's into playing drums. Is it my music they're playing? No.

Tavis: Have you figured out -- this is really a stupid question. It won't be the first or the last I've asked -- have you figured out what your genius is? What allowed for that genius? I mean, I can quote these numbers and stats all day long. What is this that we're talking about? Have you figured this out?

Bacharach: I'm not a good figurer. If you would ask me how many hits I've had, how many songs I've written, anything, I cannot be analytical and say what it is. I feel very blessed. You know, I didn't think I was talented at all when I started. I wrote some really bad songs initially, really bad songs, songs that you will never hear.

Tavis: Well, you got over it (laughter), you got over it. I will close by reminding you that the numbers prove the fact that Burt Bacharach got over it. His new project, first solo project in fifteen years, "At This Time". Anytime that Burt Bacharach puts something out is a good time. Nice to have you on the program.

Bacharach: Thank you, Tavis, and I am more proud of this than anything I've ever done. Going online to say that.

Tavis: Glad to have you on the program. That's our show for tonight. You can catch me on the weekends on PRI, Public Radio International. Check your local radio listings. I'll see you back here next time on PBS. Until then, good night from Los Angeles. Thanks for watching and, as always, keep the faith.

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i loved the Burt interview. No complaints about that. Burt really told it the way it is. But the couple that came on before him really put a bad taste in my mouth. So what if you are black or a woman or-horror of horrors-a black woman! Why make such a big deal about it. I am the minority in the city in which i live. Am I making a big deal about it? No.

Bottom line-Burt was brilliant. His preamble on the show left much to be desired.

A lot of my feelings could be attributed to the fact that I hate NPR. Tavis' show seemed like a Saturday Night Live skit to me.

One thought - I wish that the vocals at the end of " Always Taking Aim" went on a little longer. Seems like there is so much more to say after " I know that love is never far away-always taking aim..." I want to hear MORE of this song. It sounds like the soundtrack of my life. And the music at the end is so beautiful. Like some of the critics are saying-Kenny G-ish. but I like Kenny G. so that's fine with me.

For those of you who have seen Burt live lately-is this played at the concert?

I hope so. I think it's the best song on the album.

Reading the transcript of the TV interview it's noticeable how guarded he is in his criticism of the American administration over the War in Iraq. I heard and read dozens of interviews he have while he was here in the UK recently and he was much more prepared then to let his anger and frustration show.

As for the lyrics on 'At This Time', far from finding them 'banal' or 'embarrasing' I'd say it's their very directness which by and large makes them effective. For instance, I've played 'Who are these People' to several friends and they've all been astosnished by its power and daring. However, I'll admit the lyric to 'Dreams' makes me wince slightly.

With a man of Bacharach's reputation it's very easy to fall in to the trap of expecting too much from new material. I just think it's marvellous that he's has found enough inspiration in his late 70s to compose, arrange and produce another album. Let's face it, with his enormous musical legacy it would be very easy for him to rest on his laurels. The history of great songwriters still being creative in old age is virtually non-existent. Of course Gershwin died in his late 30s and Kern when he was 60, but the wells of Porter, Berlin and Rodgers had all but dried up by the time they'd all reached their late 60s. I'm simply enjoying everything that's good about the album, and there's an awful lot of that.

Reading the transcript of the TV interview it's noticeable how guarded he is in his criticism of the American administration over the War in Iraq. I heard and read dozens of interviews he gave while he was here in the UK recently and he was much more prepared then to let his anger and frustration show.

As for the lyrics on 'At This Time', far from finding them 'banal' or 'embarrasing' I'd say it's their very directness which by and large makes them effective. For instance, I've played 'Who are these People' to several friends and they've all been astosnished by its power and daring. However, I'll admit the lyric to 'Dreams' makes me wince slightly.

With a man of Bacharach's reputation it's very easy to fall in to the trap of expecting too much from new material. I just think it's marvellous that he's has found enough inspiration in his late 70s to compose, arrange and produce another album. Let's face it, with his enormous musical legacy it would be very easy for him to rest on his laurels. The history of great songwriters still being creative in old age is virtually non-existent. Of course Gershwin died in his late 30s and Kern when he was 60, but the wells of Porter, Berlin and Rodgers had all but dried up by the time they'd all reached their late 60s. I'm simply enjoying everything that's good about the album, and there's an awful lot of that.

Great points. It's still thrilling to me to have mentioned Burt along with Gershein (s) and Porter. He certanly deserves to be up there-even with this album.

I am so in love with the man and his music that i don't want to find any flaws...but maybe i do. just a little on this album. there is no "alfie" or raindrops on this album, but still, it is incredible. But there does seem so be something missing with some of the songs

I bought the cd a few weeks ago and i loved it when i heard it for the first time.
However there are a few moments that he use some old arrangments,such as the voice of Sally Stevens on Is Love Enough? listen to the track (There is Time on Woman) Fade Away ( listen to New York Lady on Woman) or even a slightly BC and the SK.
But in alway it is a great and astonishing body of work by BURT.
He really can express himself in his mind and feelings with this beautiful album!

P.S. Always Taking Aim (GREAT GREAT)

Kind regards Marcel (from the Netherlands)

Dutchess,
Sony BMG has put hidden software on your cd, and this is to supposedly "fight" piracy.....through their so-called copyright protection. The enhanced "cd" has created many, many problems with computer users. The cd can be played on a regular cd player with no problem, but once you pop it into a computer cd, the disc writes a program on your hard drive, that not only cause problems with playing it,
but creates a hole for hackers to attack you computer!
This "secret" software that some exec at Sony ok'd to have put on
is not the way to control copyright stealing. It is an out and out blasphemous, blatent violation to computer users everywhere, and Sony has finally realized it, and stopped the proliferation of this hidden software. If you purchase an enhanced copy from them, and have not played any enhanced software cd's on your computer, DO NOT play it
on your machine.As for getting the hidden software off, I am not technically
savvy, and don;t know how you would take it off, but I suspect by finding
the folders, and deleting them.
I think SONY is finding out that people are willing to buy music if they can
provide the services people want and make the music available to be
transferred to an IPOD, once the fee is paid,etc...