MANILOW MAGIC FAN CLUB - DALLAS
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News articles from 2006
News articles from 2005 and 2004
http://contactmusic.com/new/xmlfeed.nsf/mndwebpages/manilow%20plans%20audio%20book_18_02_2006
Veteran crooner BARRY MANILOW is planning to make an audio autobiography,
as he has been spending years archiving his life on tape.
The COPACABANA heart-throb had his life story
SWEET LIFE: ADVENTURES ON THE WAY TO PARADISE published in the 1980s.
But he insists it's time for a sequel.
He says, "I have tapes and tapes of recordings of my life. There are years and years of cassettes.
"I saved everything and now have a warehouse full of them so,
little by little, I've been putting my life story on audio."
http://biz.yahoo.com/iw/060214/0109966.html
Press Release Source: Rhino Entertainment
#1 Album Recording Artist Barry Manilow and STILETTO New Media
Announce Exclusive Distribution Agreement With Rhino Entertainment
Tuesday February 14, 9:34 pm ET
Deal to Cover 10 Manilow Shows Over the Next 4 Years
BURBANK, CA--(MARKET WIRE)--Feb 14, 2006 -- Superstar Barry Manilow, currently holding the #1 album position on the charts, and STILETTO New Media have signed a multi-year agreement with Rhino Entertainment, an industry leader in marketing and distribution of music and television on DVD, to distribute Manilow's original performances on DVD.
http://www.hmv.co.uk/hmvweb/displayProductDetails.do?ctx=12;-1;-1;-1&sku=468225
HMV in the UK has the new CD available for pre-order
and looks like it is yet another version with 2 bonus songs. Those
of us in the US and
other Region 1 countries need to be aware that the DVD part probably won't
play in our players,
unless you have a region free one. But - it looks like just the regular
CD has the bonus songs
so you shouldn't have to buy the Dual Disc.
Here's a link where you can see some video clips from the DVD -
including one interview/behind the scenes clip:
http://www.rhino.com/retrovid/VideoKeeper.lasso?Artist=Barry%20Manilow
http://www.billboard.com/bbcom/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1002199601
Early Manilow Albums Expanded For Reissue
March 20, 2006, 3:30 PM ET
Jonathan Cohen, N.Y.
Three of Barry Manilow's early hit albums will be reissued in expanded form May 9 via Legacy/Arista. 1974's "Manilow II," 1975's "Tryin' To Get the Feeling" and 1978's "Even Now" will each feature two previously unreleased bonus tracks.
"Manilow II" launched the artist into the pop music stratosphere, thanks to the singles "Mandy," which hit No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100, and "It's a Miracle," which reached No. 12. The new edition features an early version of album track "Home Again" dubbed "Into Lovin' You" and the unreleased "Star Children," which Manilow wrote in 1971 in tribute to fallen rock heroes Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison.
"Tryin' To Get the Feeling" was Manilow's first top 5 album chart entry and spawned the No. 1 smash "I Write the Songs" and the No. 10 title track. It is expanded here with the previously unreleased Melissa Manchester co-write "Good News," as well as "One Hundred Women Later."
By "Even Now," Manilow was one of the most popular artists in the world, a stature he cemented with the iconic disco-themed single "Copacabana (At the Copa)." The new edition's bonus tracks are co-writes with Carole Bayer Sager on "I'm Comin' Home Again" and Adrienne Anderson on "Make You Music."
Manilow is enjoying a banner 2006 thanks to his latest Arista studio album, "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties." The set has sold more than 568,000 copies in the United States since its January release, according to Nielsen SoundScan.
Look for the artist to appear on this week's episode of "American
Idol" and in May on NBC's "Today" summer concert series.
http://www.calendarlive.com/music/cl-ca-manilow12mar12,0,7226037.story?coll=cl-music
POP MUSIC
Barry, going the distance
Defying critical barbs, cruelties of age and showbiz odds, Barry Manilow is still in the game -- even if he doesn't always get to play by his rules.
By Geoff Boucher, Times Staff Writer
LIKE clockwork, the Mercedes arrived and parked at the foot of a runway in the small, posh airport that serves this air-conditioned resort city. The famous driver, with no luggage, climbed aboard a sleek little jet. Not 10 minutes later, the plane whisked past scrub and sagebrush and up through desert thermals.
And just like that, Barry Manilow was on his way to work.
The singer's home is a five-minute drive from the airport so, even though he plays five shows a week at the Las Vegas Hilton, he sleeps in his own bed. "I live in Palm Springs," he explained of the hilltop house where he lives alone. "There's just no quiet in Vegas."
----------------------------------------------------------------------
FOR THE RECORD:
Barry Manilow -An article about Barry Manilow in Sunday Calendar misstated his parents' heritage. The pop singer's mother has a Russian Jewish background while his father's roots are Irish. The article said the opposite. Also, it said that Manilow wrote the McDonald's advertising jingle "You Deserve a Break Today." He only sang it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
A short time later, the plane banked and a sharp curtain of sunlight fell across the 62-year-old songwriter's distinctive profile, the same profile that still turns him sullen at the thought of photo shoots despite three decades of fame. Squinting, he surveyed the rugged terrain below. "It's beautiful in the light, isn't it?" he asked. Maybe we all appreciate moments in the sun more as we get older; three weeks ago, "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties," Manilow's new album (the 54th of his career), debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. pop charts, a feat he had never accomplished, not even in the days of "Mandy," "Copacabana (At the Copa)," or all the other 1970s hits that made him a star. No one was more surprised by this than Manilow. "I was floored. It's unreal, absolutely unreal."
Keeping it real is an interesting concept when it comes to Manilow. His recordings possess a spot in the popular consciousness comparable to the paintings of Thomas Kinkade: They are undeniably popular, highly polished in their craft and possessing of a trademark twinkle. That twinkle, to true believers, makes the songs magical but it makes everyone else pretty much giggle or groan.
When he catapulted onto the charts in 1974 with the melodramatic hit "Mandy," Manilow was lanky and almost girlish with his doe eyes and blond tresses, a Shaun Cassidy look-alike behind a baby grand. His handlers fibbed about his age (he was 32, not 29), hoping to enhance his affinity with the Tiger Beat crowd, and Manilow became a king of the slow-skate song. The hits dried up in the early 1980s and Manilow shifted, through age and necessity, to a stage presence more like Liza Minnelli - head back, chin aimed at the spotlight and belting out songs of show-stopping vindication typified by "I Made It Through the Rain." In one-on-one conversation, Manilow is far less melodramatic.
"I'm good, not great," he said as the plane streaked toward the state line. "I know the difference. Sinatra is great. Judy [Garland] is great. Tony Bennett is great. I'm pretty good. But you can go far on pretty good if you work hard and pay attention."
The singer is well aware of the perception of him, which ranks somewhere between Wayne Newton and "Riverdance" for cool-factor rating. "Ask the general guy out in the public about me, he doesn't get it and the critics, well, they've never gotten it," Manilow said. "That's OK. The fans get it. And I've never been part of what's going on. I've always been on the outside."
Manilow was at a loss when asked if he knew the music of any of the other artists on the album charts today. He looked to his personal assistant. "Do I?" The singer's face was completely blank. "Wait, Mary J. Blige, I know her music, but not the new stuff." He shrugged at the rest of the names mentioned.
"The music I love, the things I care about, it's Gershwin and show tunes and standards I've always been separate from what was going on, even when I was getting radio hits. Even when I've been No. 1, I was somewhere else."
This time, with the new album, the somewhere else is five decades ago, singing "Unchained Melody," "Venus," "Beyond the Sea" and other jukebox selections from the Eisenhower administration. For the record, Manilow had no desire to do this album, none at all: "What on Earth are you going to do different with songs that everybody has heard a million times?"
But the idea for the album came from Clive Davis, the music impresario who has been a guiding hand in the career resurrections of Carlos Santana and Rod Stewart, the latter a rocker who was coaxed into performing standards with spectacular commercial results. Davis has been at Manilow's back since the very beginning. It was at Davis' urging that Manilow recorded "Mandy," a song the singer wasn't particularly enthused about at the time.
"When he talks, I listen," Manilow said. "Clive understands what will work, what people want, what will be successful in the market." That is not the case with Manilow. Whether he is sitting in the pressurized cabin of his Gulfstream jet or singing at center stage, Manilow is in a bubble that blurs his view when he tries to peer out. He is wary when he speaks and plainly mystified by pop culture, circa 2006.
"Television is just - ugh - I can't bear watching anything anymore since 'Laverne & Shirley' went off the air." The shows he enjoys most these days are archival collections of old variety shows, some on kinescope. Davis has him working now on a list of 1960s songs for the logical follow-up to "Greatest Songs of the Fifties." Don't expect to hear anthems of the counterculture. Woodstock doesn't echo in Manilow's ears.
"When it comes to the music of the 1960s, it's Andy Williams," he said without a trace of irony. "Andy Williams was the 1960s."
* Firing the shot first
MANILOW has got the Palm Springs look down. He arrived for the plane trip in a pristine windbreaker, black slacks ironed to a razor crease and wide silver rings on two fingers. Like many of the fans he plays to, he has turned to makeup and plastic surgery to keep his appearance as youthful as his outlook. But despite all of that, it's easy to hear the workaday inflections of the Brooklyn neighborhood where he grew up. Manilow has been beaten up by critics for so long it'd be easy for him to turn severe or go reclusive. Instead he sports the same strategy as William Shatner - mock yourself before the other guy does.
"I don't take myself seriously, and I haven't for a long time. But maybe in the early days, in the 1970s; back then, after 'Mandy,' there were these reviews that were really, really brutal. I didn't understand the whole thing, how these people could say something so cruel and personal to someone they didn't know. I didn't do anything to them or to their mother, but they were tearing me up for what I did, the way I dressed, my hair, everything. And I thought I was doing great. I still do. I'm proud. But you do have to stop taking yourself seriously or it will just tear you up."
Manilow shifted in his seat and made a sour face. He didn't want to talk anymore. "My throat, I'm getting hoarse."
A few moments later he was back in a comfortable spot in his bubble of music culture. "Dean Martin is so underrated," he said during a long discussion of Vegas performers. He began dissecting Martin's stage shtick, the banter and the false appearance of effortlessness. The next topic was Liberace, a performer Manilow thought very little of until he recently viewed some old performances.
"Man, he could play the piano; I gained a lot more respect for him," Manilow said. He held his hands up and began to describe Liberace's deftness by playing the air in front of him. "Forget all of the rest of the stuff - the costumes, the candelabra on stage, all of it - he was an amazing pianist. He was playing this complicated Chopin piece and there was not a single clam, he killed it."
Manilow questioning the cultural heft of Liberace might invite thoughts of how much in common they share, but if this occurred to Manilow, it was never apparent in his expression. The plane touched down smoothly in Las Vegas. A short drive later, Manilow stood at a rear entrance to the Hilton, the same building where Elvis Presley famously performed during his strange career twilight in the city of casinos.
"This, this is my life here, walking in with the garbage," Manilow said. He was passing by a loading dock behind the hotel's huge kitchen and the stench from the dumpsters was overpowering. The unfinished cocktails and discarded mounds from the buffet had been putrefying in the desert heat all day. As some Hilton security people watched with unease, Manilow stopped, strolled over to the trash bins and asked for his picture to be taken. "It'll be great! If you don't use it you can send it to me." He gave a wan smile and stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. After the flashes stopped, he walked toward backstage in silence.
* Roller-coaster ride
IT'S hard to fathom the highs and lows Manilow must feel when he looks out on his image reflected in pop culture. He's a bright man, so it cannot escape him when he is mocked. A typical swipe at the former jingle writer: Robert Hilburn in The Times in 1977 wrote, "I still think this guy hit his peak when he wrote the State Farm Insurance commercial. I wonder if they have a policy protecting us from sentimental sludge like this." When the Ray Stevens spoof song "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow" came out in the late 1970s, the singer's name was already synonymous with saccharine. Adding insult to injury, the face of Beavis, the cartoon moron on "Beavis and Butthead," was partly based on Manilow's features.
But the only thing worse than bad press is no press. The publicity material he sends out contains a line from Rolling Stone magazine from two decades ago that acknowledged that "most probably he's the showman of our generation," but the latest edition of the Rolling Stone Album Guide, a reference of the first order in pop and rock music, ignores Manilow completely. Not a single album is reviewed. The guide has enough ink to include reviews of every album released by Neil Diamond, Celine Dion and ABBA - not to mention appraisals of 'N Sync, Vanilla Ice and Milli Vanilli.
"Barry has absolutely been underrated and not recognized often enough as being one of the truly timeless voices and artists," Davis said. The music executive said that through the years he often counseled Manilow and told him to try to ignore the critical barbs. "Most of the critics are of rock background and that's an insular view they don't appreciate people of pure pop style," Davis said. "But the pop songs define a time."
Things have changed for Manilow with the success of the new album and the Vegas show, "Music and Passion," which debuted in February 2005. The engagement at the Hilton came after "One Night Live! One Last Time!" that was billed as Manilow's last road tour. "Music and Passion" also spawned a special with the same title that aired March 9 on PBS, which will certainly push his album further up the charts this week.
"What this new album allowed me to do is get made fun of on all of the television talk shows I couldn't get on last year," Manilow said. "And that feels great. It means I'm back on their radar." Davis, the record executive, had told Manilow that the way to hammer away on the album's sales would be to run through every television appearance possible. And Manilow did just that, even if it meant singing "Copacabana" on "Dancing With the Stars" and immersing himself in the foreign trappings of "American Idol." It would seem logical to presume that Manilow seems made for these television times (How far off could Clay Aiken be from Manilow's musical core?), but the singer says the new-model shows are a mystery to him.
"I don't get this stuff, it's oddball stuff, but it's what you have to do now," he said. "There are no variety shows now, and with most of the talk shows if you get on, you're relegated to the last three minutes of the show. On ["The Tonight Show" with Johnny] Carson I used to come over and sit down on the couch for half the show. It was the same with [Carson's replacement, Jay] Leno in the early days. That's gone for music now."
Manilow's most surreal adventure of late was a visit to Martha Stewart's show. He diligently showed up as his record label had asked, but he tried to beg out when Stewart's people said the show would have him spend a good deal of the broadcast in the set's kitchen.
"How strange is it that now on television you have to sing 'Unchained Melody' in a kitchen? Honestly, that is just bizarre. And look, I don't even go into a kitchen. I was raised by people that didn't go into kitchens. My mom and stepfather were out all of the time getting drunk. They would tell me to pop a frozen dinner into the oven. So I go on the show and I'm terrified that I'm going to make an idiot of myself. I walk out and I see this big thing in the corner with a window. I ask, 'Well, what's that?' They tell me, 'That's a refrigerator.' And I'm thinking to myself, 'This is not going to go well. It didn't look like a refrigerator; it had a window on the front. What do I know?' "
Manilow has been tuning in to "Idol" more lately, and there is talk that he might have a special appearance on the show that, considering its gargantuan influence these days, is something he is excited about. How would he have done as an "American Idol" contestant? "Are you kidding? I never would have made it, not for a minute. Can you imagine me winning? I can't."
* A legacy in song
A few hours before call time at the Hilton, Manilow meandered to the middle of the hotel's theater, crossed his arms and made a face. On stage, his band and singers were hammering away at the dense crescendo of a medley of songs from Manilow's album "Here at the Mayflower." The swirl of music and cross-lyric vocals is intended to create the energy of a street party, but at that moment it sounded more like a riot of conflicting musical ideas.
"It's a mess," Manilow announced. The players and singers on stage run through again and again and again. Manilow peels away layers, subtracting from the arrangement. He tells one player: "That long note you're playing, if I wrote that long note, I didn't mean to. I hate it." By the end, after a dozen tries, the section of the song is far crisper and more powerful to the ear. "That's it, that'll do," Manilow said.
A New York girl of Irish heritage named Edna Manilow married Harold Pincus, who was of Russian Jewish lineage, but they divorced not long after the birth of their son, Barry, who would legally take his mother's name in his teen years. She and her ex-husband's parents raised the boy and eked out a living in a neighborhood that Manilow has described as streets of laundry lines and hardscrabble lives. The boy loved music and took up the accordion. His grandfather took a profound interest in the youngster's budding musicality.
During his shows at the Hilton, Manilow weaves this family lore into the act by telling how his grandfather spent his hard-earned quarters dropping them into a novelty recording booth and coaxing the child to sing. Manilow even pauses during the show, and some of those early recordings are piped in for the crowd. There's an expected sentimental rush among the audience, which skews toward the senior citizen set and is dominated by women.
Many have been seeing him for years; the "Fanilows," as his most devout followers call themselves, are sort of like Deadheads but with AARP cards and a penchant for sequins and late-model Cadillac sedans. Despite the ardor of the audience (which lets out a mildly lusty cheer when Manilow sways his hips or doffs his shiny jacket), Manilow said the shows at the Hilton have been the hardest work he's had in decades. The crowd is watered down by high rollers, camp guests and tourists who, unlike the Fanilows, aren't screaming from the first notes. "I really have to dig most nights, so it is different. But they leave happy, and it's a great challenge."
Manilow does a show-stopping duet of "Mandy" - which he happens to perform with himself. The song is set up by a 1975 video of Davis on the old "Midnight Special" music show introducing his great new find, Manilow, who performs with those same doe eyes and a shimmering mane of hair. The video pauses and Manilow, behind a piano that floats to center stage, begins swapping verses with himself. The crowd, of course, goes wild.
If there is a song that defines Manilow it's probably "I Write the Songs" with its over-the-top opening lines: "I've been alive forever / And I wrote the very first song / I put the words and the melodies together / I am music / And I write the songs."
It's a funny twist that Manilow didn't actually write "I Write the Songs" (it was Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys, in tribute to Brian Wilson), but its sweeping music and soft-focus earnestness make it an anthem for the singer and his fans, who sing along at the Hilton with moist eyes. Fanilows love their idol's unabashed sentimentalism, and plenty of songs have a melancholy theme. His songs make the young girls cry, as the song goes, but he said he gets through life without too many tears.
"If I had one thing I could change, it would be the fact that I don't really have conversations and get to meet and know people," he said. He paused and chose his words carefully. "I walk into a room, or an elevator or a party or whatever, and I can't have real conversations. People can't get past this star-guy thing. It's not lonely, but if I could get anything back, it would be that - to talk to people, you know, not just sing to them. But I've got no complaints."
* Just a little bit of Barry's in store
BARRY MANILOW'S die-hard fans are notoriously passionate - they are called "Fanilows" - and the singer gives them plenty of ways to express their affection with cash, check or credit card.
At the Las Vegas Hilton, you can visit the Manilow store to buy a "Copacabana" bobble head, "Mandy" T-shirts, back issues of the singer's slick fan magazine, Manilow-approved jewelry that runs as pricey as $950 for a necklace or a bottle of Manilow's own brand of Cabernet Sauvignon from a vineyard in Northern California.
For $10, you can join the BMIFC (that would be the Barry Manilow International Fan Club), and for $1,000, you can attend the club's August convention in Vegas and maybe even meet the man.
Manilow is hardly the only veteran artist who has branded himself and his music (Jimmy Buffett has a chain of "Margaritaville" bars, for example), but there may be no one who does more of it. "The main thing is not to embarrass yourself," Manilow said of the revenue streams. His fans, though, are encouraged to embarrass themselves - the Manilow Store has an elaborate recording booth where, for $20, customers can record themselves as they belt out the old hits.
- G.B.
** He charts the songs
Barry Manilow had a successful career as a jingle writer (among them: "Like a Good Neighbor, State Farm Is There" and "You Deserve a Break Today at McDonald's") and became a star with a run of 1970s hits. "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties" is the first Manilow collection to hit No. 1 on the album chart since "Barry Manilow Live" in 1977 and the only one to debut in the top spot. The singer has recorded 17 singles that broke the Top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, but none have charted since 1988. The hits and peak position:
1974
"Mandy" (1)
1975
"It's a Miracle" (12)
"Could It Be Magic" (6)
"I Write the Songs" (1)
1976
"Tryin' to Get the Feeling Again" (10)
"Weekend in New England" (10)
1977
"Looks Like We Made It" (1)
1978
"Can't Smile Without You" (3)
"Even Now" (19)
"Copacabana (At the Copa)" (8)
"Ready to Take a Chance Again" (11)
1979
"Somewhere in the Night" (9)
"Ships" (9)
"When I Wanted You" (20)
1980
"I Made It Through the Rain" (10)
1981
"The Old Songs" (15)
1983
"Read 'Em and Weep" (18)
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Contact Geoff Boucher at calendar.letters @latimes.com.
10 March 2006
THE NEW HIGHS OF MANILOW
By Julia Kuttner
He may be universally known for his rather cheesy, middle of the road hits such as Copacabana, but Barry Manilow fast approaching his 60th birthday still likes to keep up with current musical trends. He says he despairs of modern songwriting and prefers to listen to electronica instead.
"At the moment, I'm enjoying groups like Underworld, Basement Jaxx, Groove Armada and Dirty Vegas," admits Brooklyn-born Barry, who counts pop entrepreneur Simon Cowell as one of his closest friends. "I've got a list in iTunes that is filled with interesting, daring, rhythmical geniuses. It's probably because songwriting as a craft, is done."
Manilow's nostalgia for an era when classic songs were cut in studios across America has given him his first US No 1 album since 1977. The Greatest Songs Of The Fifties, which is out here on Monday, went straight in at the top spot when it was released Stateside last month and sees Barry following in a trend started by Rod Stewart who has been cashing in with his American Songbook series.
To record the new album, Barry teamedup with his old record company label boss Clive Davies who has known him since he worked his way up from a post boy to a headlining act.
Boasting tracks such as Are You Lonesome Tonight, Unchained Melody and What A Difference A Day Makes, it is the 58th album release of his career.
"What we've resorted to these days is badly crafted pop songs sung by singers who are insistent on doing vocal acrobatics," berates Barry, whose trademarks are his year-round tan and distinctive nose.
"They do all that because there are no lyrics to sing. Something has to happen. If you're doing idiotic lyrics like, 'Baby, oh baby. Come back to me. Deee deee ter deee', there is nothing to sing.
"Being a composer and being raised on great material, that kind of music turns me off because there is no song there. So I go off to the electronica world where they are taking chances. It may not be in the lyrics, but musically they are striking me. I'm afraid, though, I'm a bit too grumpy to go out and see bands like Underworld at festivals."
Born Barry Alan Pincus in a New York tenement in June 1943 his father was a Russian Jew, his mother Irish Manilow started out as a commercial jingle writer before teaming up with Bette Midler as her producer and pianist. He then dominated the soft-rock scene in the '70s with a string of Top 10 hits and multi-platinum albums.
Despite more than 30 years in showbusiness, Barry has managed to keep his private life exactly that, but he is now poised to reveal all in a documentary.
Since his early success, he has meticulously filled boxes with cassette recordings of conversations with colleagues, family and friends. Eventually, they took up so much space that he had to move them to a warehouse with enough room to store all his memories.
Two decades ago Barry penned an autobiography and there have also been a couple of unauthorised books along the way. So maybe now is the time for Barry to put the record straight.
"I'm working on a lot of ideas of things to do with these tapes," he admits. "Every part of my life has been recorded, but I don't think a second book is the answer. I've been saving it all up and it's all there in the warehouse."
Buried away among his collection are tapes of conversations with Barry's grandad who inspired him as a youngster and encouraged him to become an entertainer. Another, more unlikely, figure who looms large in Manilow's life is the X Factor judge and pop supremo Simon Cowell. The pair became close pals in the '90s when Cowell resurrected Barry's career in the UK with remixes of Copacabana and Could It Be Magic.
"There's nothing I wouldn't do for Simon," confirms Barry. "Anything he asks, I'll do."
Cowell also helped Barry became a household name to a new generation when he appeared as a guest judge on Simon's American Idol show, and Manilow says working with potential new stars was inspirational.
"At first, when I was talking to these children, it was like I was talking Chinese," says Barry. "But I think eventually I helped every single one of them. It was like I was taking a masterclass. By the end of a week they were hugging and kissing me when their arrangements came through.
"I gave them context and asked them to think about who they were singing to. Was it a girlfriend, a boyfriend, their grandfather or a friend? They had to be taught to interpret songs. Even Simon looked at me and said, `What have you done to these people?'"
Barry is midway through a recently-extended multi-million dollar contract which will see him perform hundreds of concerts at the Las Vegas Hilton through to next year. But ask him who he is singing to when he's performing heart-wrenching ballads such as Are You Lonesome Tonight and he clams up and says, "You know I couldn't possibly tell you the answer to that.
"There's always been the Barry Manilow in capital letters and the Barry Manilow with regular letters. What I mean by that is the star in capital letters is a celebrity, the public figure and the corporation. Then there's the human being and that's what one must learn how to deal with."
Oh well, maybe we'll just have to wait for that documentary after all.
The Greatest Songs Of The Fifties is on sale from Monday.
LA Time interview
http://www.calendarlive.com/music/cl-ca-manilow12mar12,0,7226037.story?coll=cl-music
POP MUSIC
Barry, going the distance
Defying critical barbs, cruelties of age and showbiz odds, Barry Manilow is still in the game -- even if he doesn't always get to play by his rules.
By Geoff Boucher, Times Staff Writer
LIKE clockwork, the Mercedes arrived and parked at the foot of a runway in the small, posh airport that serves this air-conditioned resort city. The famous driver, with no luggage, climbed aboard a sleek little jet. Not 10 minutes later, the plane whisked past scrub and sagebrush and up through desert thermals.
And just like that, Barry Manilow was on his way to work.
The singer's home is a five-minute drive from the airport so, even though he plays five shows a week at the Las Vegas Hilton, he sleeps in his own bed. "I live in Palm Springs," he explained of the hilltop house where he lives alone. "There's just no quiet in Vegas."
----------------------------------------------------------------------
FOR THE RECORD:
Barry Manilow -An article about Barry Manilow in Sunday Calendar misstated his parents' heritage. The pop singer's mother has a Russian Jewish background while his father's roots are Irish. The article said the opposite. Also, it said that Manilow wrote the McDonald's advertising jingle "You Deserve a Break Today." He only sang it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
A short time later, the plane banked and a sharp curtain of sunlight fell across the 62-year-old songwriter's distinctive profile, the same profile that still turns him sullen at the thought of photo shoots despite three decades of fame. Squinting, he surveyed the rugged terrain below. "It's beautiful in the light, isn't it?" he asked. Maybe we all appreciate moments in the sun more as we get older; three weeks ago, "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties," Manilow's new album (the 54th of his career), debuted at No. 1 on the U.S. pop charts, a feat he had never accomplished, not even in the days of "Mandy," "Copacabana (At the Copa)," or all the other 1970s hits that made him a star. No one was more surprised by this than Manilow. "I was floored. It's unreal, absolutely unreal."
Keeping it real is an interesting concept when it comes to Manilow. His recordings possess a spot in the popular consciousness comparable to the paintings of Thomas Kinkade: They are undeniably popular, highly polished in their craft and possessing of a trademark twinkle. That twinkle, to true believers, makes the songs magical but it makes everyone else pretty much giggle or groan.
When he catapulted onto the charts in 1974 with the melodramatic hit "Mandy," Manilow was lanky and almost girlish with his doe eyes and blond tresses, a Shaun Cassidy look-alike behind a baby grand. His handlers fibbed about his age (he was 32, not 29), hoping to enhance his affinity with the Tiger Beat crowd, and Manilow became a king of the slow-skate song. The hits dried up in the early 1980s and Manilow shifted, through age and necessity, to a stage presence more like Liza Minnelli - head back, chin aimed at the spotlight and belting out songs of show-stopping vindication typified by "I Made It Through the Rain." In one-on-one conversation, Manilow is far less melodramatic.
"I'm good, not great," he said as the plane streaked toward the state line. "I know the difference. Sinatra is great. Judy [Garland] is great. Tony Bennett is great. I'm pretty good. But you can go far on pretty good if you work hard and pay attention."
The singer is well aware of the perception of him, which ranks somewhere between Wayne Newton and "Riverdance" for cool-factor rating. "Ask the general guy out in the public about me, he doesn't get it and the critics, well, they've never gotten it," Manilow said. "That's OK. The fans get it. And I've never been part of what's going on. I've always been on the outside."
Manilow was at a loss when asked if he knew the music of any of the other artists on the album charts today. He looked to his personal assistant. "Do I?" The singer's face was completely blank. "Wait, Mary J. Blige, I know her music, but not the new stuff." He shrugged at the rest of the names mentioned.
"The music I love, the things I care about, it's Gershwin and show tunes and standards I've always been separate from what was going on, even when I was getting radio hits. Even when I've been No. 1, I was somewhere else."
This time, with the new album, the somewhere else is five decades ago, singing "Unchained Melody," "Venus," "Beyond the Sea" and other jukebox selections from the Eisenhower administration. For the record, Manilow had no desire to do this album, none at all: "What on Earth are you going to do different with songs that everybody has heard a million times?"
But the idea for the album came from Clive Davis, the music impresario who has been a guiding hand in the career resurrections of Carlos Santana and Rod Stewart, the latter a rocker who was coaxed into performing standards with spectacular commercial results. Davis has been at Manilow's back since the very beginning. It was at Davis' urging that Manilow recorded "Mandy," a song the singer wasn't particularly enthused about at the time.
"When he talks, I listen," Manilow said. "Clive understands what will work, what people want, what will be successful in the market." That is not the case with Manilow. Whether he is sitting in the pressurized cabin of his Gulfstream jet or singing at center stage, Manilow is in a bubble that blurs his view when he tries to peer out. He is wary when he speaks and plainly mystified by pop culture, circa 2006.
"Television is just - ugh - I can't bear watching anything anymore since 'Laverne & Shirley' went off the air." The shows he enjoys most these days are archival collections of old variety shows, some on kinescope. Davis has him working now on a list of 1960s songs for the logical follow-up to "Greatest Songs of the Fifties." Don't expect to hear anthems of the counterculture. Woodstock doesn't echo in Manilow's ears.
"When it comes to the music of the 1960s, it's Andy Williams," he said without a trace of irony. "Andy Williams was the 1960s."
* Firing the shot first
MANILOW has got the Palm Springs look down. He arrived for the plane trip in a pristine windbreaker, black slacks ironed to a razor crease and wide silver rings on two fingers. Like many of the fans he plays to, he has turned to makeup and plastic surgery to keep his appearance as youthful as his outlook. But despite all of that, it's easy to hear the workaday inflections of the Brooklyn neighborhood where he grew up. Manilow has been beaten up by critics for so long it'd be easy for him to turn severe or go reclusive. Instead he sports the same strategy as William Shatner - mock yourself before the other guy does.
"I don't take myself seriously, and I haven't for a long time. But maybe in the early days, in the 1970s; back then, after 'Mandy,' there were these reviews that were really, really brutal. I didn't understand the whole thing, how these people could say something so cruel and personal to someone they didn't know. I didn't do anything to them or to their mother, but they were tearing me up for what I did, the way I dressed, my hair, everything. And I thought I was doing great. I still do. I'm proud. But you do have to stop taking yourself seriously or it will just tear you up."
Manilow shifted in his seat and made a sour face. He didn't want to talk anymore. "My throat, I'm getting hoarse."
A few moments later he was back in a comfortable spot in his bubble of music culture. "Dean Martin is so underrated," he said during a long discussion of Vegas performers. He began dissecting Martin's stage shtick, the banter and the false appearance of effortlessness. The next topic was Liberace, a performer Manilow thought very little of until he recently viewed some old performances.
"Man, he could play the piano; I gained a lot more respect for him," Manilow said. He held his hands up and began to describe Liberace's deftness by playing the air in front of him. "Forget all of the rest of the stuff - the costumes, the candelabra on stage, all of it - he was an amazing pianist. He was playing this complicated Chopin piece and there was not a single clam, he killed it."
Manilow questioning the cultural heft of Liberace might invite thoughts of how much in common they share, but if this occurred to Manilow, it was never apparent in his expression. The plane touched down smoothly in Las Vegas. A short drive later, Manilow stood at a rear entrance to the Hilton, the same building where Elvis Presley famously performed during his strange career twilight in the city of casinos.
"This, this is my life here, walking in with the garbage," Manilow said. He was passing by a loading dock behind the hotel's huge kitchen and the stench from the dumpsters was overpowering. The unfinished cocktails and discarded mounds from the buffet had been putrefying in the desert heat all day. As some Hilton security people watched with unease, Manilow stopped, strolled over to the trash bins and asked for his picture to be taken. "It'll be great! If you don't use it you can send it to me." He gave a wan smile and stuffed his hands in his jacket pockets. After the flashes stopped, he walked toward backstage in silence.
* Roller-coaster ride
IT'S hard to fathom the highs and lows Manilow must feel when he looks out on his image reflected in pop culture. He's a bright man, so it cannot escape him when he is mocked. A typical swipe at the former jingle writer: Robert Hilburn in The Times in 1977 wrote, "I still think this guy hit his peak when he wrote the State Farm Insurance commercial. I wonder if they have a policy protecting us from sentimental sludge like this." When the Ray Stevens spoof song "I Need Your Help, Barry Manilow" came out in the late 1970s, the singer's name was already synonymous with saccharine. Adding insult to injury, the face of Beavis, the cartoon moron on "Beavis and Butthead," was partly based on Manilow's features.
But the only thing worse than bad press is no press. The publicity material he sends out contains a line from Rolling Stone magazine from two decades ago that acknowledged that "most probably he's the showman of our generation," but the latest edition of the Rolling Stone Album Guide, a reference of the first order in pop and rock music, ignores Manilow completely. Not a single album is reviewed. The guide has enough ink to include reviews of every album released by Neil Diamond, Celine Dion and ABBA - not to mention appraisals of 'N Sync, Vanilla Ice and Milli Vanilli.
"Barry has absolutely been underrated and not recognized often enough as being one of the truly timeless voices and artists," Davis said. The music executive said that through the years he often counseled Manilow and told him to try to ignore the critical barbs. "Most of the critics are of rock background and that's an insular view they don't appreciate people of pure pop style," Davis said. "But the pop songs define a time."
Things have changed for Manilow with the success of the new album and the Vegas show, "Music and Passion," which debuted in February 2005. The engagement at the Hilton came after "One Night Live! One Last Time!" that was billed as Manilow's last road tour. "Music and Passion" also spawned a special with the same title that aired March 9 on PBS, which will certainly push his album further up the charts this week.
"What this new album allowed me to do is get made fun of on all of the television talk shows I couldn't get on last year," Manilow said. "And that feels great. It means I'm back on their radar." Davis, the record executive, had told Manilow that the way to hammer away on the album's sales would be to run through every television appearance possible. And Manilow did just that, even if it meant singing "Copacabana" on "Dancing With the Stars" and immersing himself in the foreign trappings of "American Idol." It would seem logical to presume that Manilow seems made for these television times (How far off could Clay Aiken be from Manilow's musical core?), but the singer says the new-model shows are a mystery to him.
"I don't get this stuff, it's oddball stuff, but it's what you have to do now," he said. "There are no variety shows now, and with most of the talk shows if you get on, you're relegated to the last three minutes of the show. On ["The Tonight Show" with Johnny] Carson I used to come over and sit down on the couch for half the show. It was the same with [Carson's replacement, Jay] Leno in the early days. That's gone for music now."
Manilow's most surreal adventure of late was a visit to Martha Stewart's show. He diligently showed up as his record label had asked, but he tried to beg out when Stewart's people said the show would have him spend a good deal of the broadcast in the set's kitchen.
"How strange is it that now on television you have to sing 'Unchained Melody' in a kitchen? Honestly, that is just bizarre. And look, I don't even go into a kitchen. I was raised by people that didn't go into kitchens. My mom and stepfather were out all of the time getting drunk. They would tell me to pop a frozen dinner into the oven. So I go on the show and I'm terrified that I'm going to make an idiot of myself. I walk out and I see this big thing in the corner with a window. I ask, 'Well, what's that?' They tell me, 'That's a refrigerator.' And I'm thinking to myself, 'This is not going to go well. It didn't look like a refrigerator; it had a window on the front. What do I know?' "
Manilow has been tuning in to "Idol" more lately, and there is talk that he might have a special appearance on the show that, considering its gargantuan influence these days, is something he is excited about. How would he have done as an "American Idol" contestant? "Are you kidding? I never would have made it, not for a minute. Can you imagine me winning? I can't."
* A legacy in song
A few hours before call time at the Hilton, Manilow meandered to the middle of the hotel's theater, crossed his arms and made a face. On stage, his band and singers were hammering away at the dense crescendo of a medley of songs from Manilow's album "Here at the Mayflower." The swirl of music and cross-lyric vocals is intended to create the energy of a street party, but at that moment it sounded more like a riot of conflicting musical ideas.
"It's a mess," Manilow announced. The players and singers on stage run through again and again and again. Manilow peels away layers, subtracting from the arrangement. He tells one player: "That long note you're playing, if I wrote that long note, I didn't mean to. I hate it." By the end, after a dozen tries, the section of the song is far crisper and more powerful to the ear. "That's it, that'll do," Manilow said.
A New York girl of Irish heritage named Edna Manilow married Harold Pincus, who was of Russian Jewish lineage, but they divorced not long after the birth of their son, Barry, who would legally take his mother's name in his teen years. She and her ex-husband's parents raised the boy and eked out a living in a neighborhood that Manilow has described as streets of laundry lines and hardscrabble lives. The boy loved music and took up the accordion. His grandfather took a profound interest in the youngster's budding musicality.
During his shows at the Hilton, Manilow weaves this family lore into the act by telling how his grandfather spent his hard-earned quarters dropping them into a novelty recording booth and coaxing the child to sing. Manilow even pauses during the show, and some of those early recordings are piped in for the crowd. There's an expected sentimental rush among the audience, which skews toward the senior citizen set and is dominated by women.
Many have been seeing him for years; the "Fanilows," as his most devout followers call themselves, are sort of like Deadheads but with AARP cards and a penchant for sequins and late-model Cadillac sedans. Despite the ardor of the audience (which lets out a mildly lusty cheer when Manilow sways his hips or doffs his shiny jacket), Manilow said the shows at the Hilton have been the hardest work he's had in decades. The crowd is watered down by high rollers, camp guests and tourists who, unlike the Fanilows, aren't screaming from the first notes. "I really have to dig most nights, so it is different. But they leave happy, and it's a great challenge."
Manilow does a show-stopping duet of "Mandy" - which he happens to perform with himself. The song is set up by a 1975 video of Davis on the old "Midnight Special" music show introducing his great new find, Manilow, who performs with those same doe eyes and a shimmering mane of hair. The video pauses and Manilow, behind a piano that floats to center stage, begins swapping verses with himself. The crowd, of course, goes wild.
If there is a song that defines Manilow it's probably "I Write the Songs" with its over-the-top opening lines: "I've been alive forever / And I wrote the very first song / I put the words and the melodies together / I am music / And I write the songs."
It's a funny twist that Manilow didn't actually write "I Write the Songs" (it was Bruce Johnston of the Beach Boys, in tribute to Brian Wilson), but its sweeping music and soft-focus earnestness make it ananthem for the singer and his fans, who sing along at the Hilton with moist eyes. Fanilows love their idol's unabashed sentimentalism, and plenty of songs have a melancholy theme. His songs make the young girls cry, as the song goes, but he said he gets through life without too many tears.
"If I had one thing I could change, it would be the fact that I don't really have conversations and get to meet and know people," he said. He paused and chose his words carefully. "I walk into a room, or an elevator or a party or whatever, and I can't have real conversations. People can't get past this star-guy thing. It's not lonely, but if I could get anything back, it would be that - to talk to people, you know, not just sing to them. But I've got no complaints."
*Just a little bit of Barry's in store
BARRY MANILOW'S die-hard fans are notoriously passionate - they are called "Fanilows" - and the singer gives them plenty of ways to express their affection with cash, check or credit card.
At the Las Vegas Hilton, you can visit the Manilow store to buy a "Copacabana" bobble head, "Mandy" T-shirts, back issues of the singer's slick fan magazine, Manilow-approved jewelry that runs as pricey as $950 for a necklace or a bottle of Manilow's own brand of Cabernet Sauvignon from a vineyard in Northern California.
For $10, you can join the BMIFC (that would be the Barry Manilow International Fan Club), and for $1,000, you can attend the club's August convention in Vegas and maybe even meet the man.
Manilow is hardly the only veteran artist who has branded himself and his music (Jimmy Buffett has a chain of "Margaritaville" bars, for example), but there may be no one who does more of it. "The main thing is not to embarrass yourself," Manilow said of the revenue streams. His fans, though, are encouraged to embarrass themselves - the Manilow Store has an elaborate recording booth where, for $20, customers can record themselves as they belt out the old hits.
- G.B.
** He charts the songs
Barry Manilow had a successful career as a jingle writer (among them: "Like a Good Neighbor, State Farm Is There" and "You Deserve a Break Today at McDonald's") and became a star with a run of 1970s hits. "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties" is the first Manilow collection to hit No. 1 on the album chart since "Barry Manilow Live" in 1977 and the only one to debut in the top spot. The singer has recorded 17 singles that broke the Top 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart, but none have charted since 1988. The hits and peak position:
1974
"Mandy" (1)
1975
"It's a Miracle" (12)
"Could It Be Magic" (6)
"I Write the Songs" (1)
1976
"Tryin' to Get the Feeling Again" (10)
"Weekend in New England" (10)
1977
"Looks Like We Made It" (1)
1978
"Can't Smile Without You" (3)
"Even Now" (19)
"Copacabana (At the Copa)" (8)
"Ready to Take a Chance Again" (11)
1979
"Somewhere in the Night" (9)
"Ships" (9)
"When I Wanted You" (20)
1980
"I Made It Through the Rain" (10)
1981
"The Old Songs" (15)
1983
"Read 'Em and Weep" (18)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Contact Geoff Boucher at calendar.letters @latimes.com.
http://top40-charts.com/news.php?nid=21662
Pop / Rock (2006-03-13)
Kickin' It With Barry Manilow:
We Talk To The Man About The Importance Of Being Melodic...
Sydney, AU (SONY BMG Music Entertainment) - The legendary Barry Manilow is back with a new album, 'The Greatest Songs Of The Fifties', and it's pretty darn special. Featuring 13 classics from the era re-visited, the record gave Barry his first ever No 1 debut in the US. We had a chat with the man about the album, working with Clive Davis again and why he doesn't miss living out of a suitcase these days...
What was your first reaction when you found out the album had gone to No 1 in the US? We were all stunned. Everybody was stunned. Even Clive. Nobody expected anything quite like that. I mean I've been releasing albums every year or two for about 30 years. Some of them make it, some of them don't. You kind of get used to this roller coaster ride. You know, I have this wonderful time making them and you send them out there and you hope something will happen, and sometimes they do and sometimes they don't, but this was stunning that it entered at No 1.
What is it about this album that makes it so special? Why do you think debuted at No 1 in the US? I don't know. My guess is that the public is starved for melody and lyric. I listen to the radio not very often because I can't hear melody and lyric any more. It's all about rhythm, it's all about anger, it's all about curse words, it's all about drum machines and synthesizers and it's not well-crafted songs anymore. Suddenly here comes an album that says, 'Love Is A Many Splendoured Thing', and I think people just sigh a sigh of relief and say, 'Well, that sounds good. Let's put that one on!'
Is that what is was about the songs of the 50s that appealed to you, the melody and lyrics? They were melodic and they weren't angry. They were hopeful. They were just beautiful songs.
How much research did you do when choosing the songs for the album? A lot. Because I was very young in the 50s, it wasn't really my time. My time was when The Beatles came in. Clive Davis came up with this idea, and gave me a list of 70 songs, and I started to listen. I knew them all, (but) I didn't really know them that well, but I knew all the titles, and I just started to play around with a handful of them. I picked the ones that sounded the best on me, and I sent them in to Clive and he loved them, and there it was!
What were some of the tracks that didn't make the album?
We tried to do 'Mr Sandman'. That didn't make it, I didn't sound good on that... I tried to do 'Get A Job'. See, all those rock'n'roll songs, 'Rock Around The Clock' and all, they just didn't sound good on me, but the more romantic, melodic songs did.
You and Clive Davis obviously have an amazing working relationship. Why does it work so well? He gave me 'Mandy' back in 1975. He's a genius and a complicated guy to work with because you've got to play the game with him. All the time he gives me a demo of a song like 'Mandy' and it doesn't sound anything like what he's hearing, but he can't really describe to me what he's hearing because he's not a musician. So it's up to me, the producer, arranger, performer to figure out what he's hearing about this song that would sound good on me. And the same things happened with these 50s songs. He thought that I would sound good on some of these, and it was my job to figure out what he was hearing. And I think I nailed it because we had a ball on this one.
You'll be working at The Hilton in Las Vegas for the next couple of years. Do you miss being out on the road? I do not! Thirty years of living out of a suitcase and waiting for bad room service, thank you! I never get tired of the performing, I never get tired of the audiences and I never get tired of working with my band, but what I did get tired of was leaving on every other week, packing and flying all over the world and after 30 years of that, it just got to me.
When you first began, did you ever dream of such success? No. Never, never, never, never! I never even dreamed of singing. When I first began, I wanted to be a song-writer, an arranger, a conductor, maybe a producer, but I never sang! I did all that other stuff for other people. That's what I thought my life was going to be, until I made a demo of one of my songs, and I had an offer from Dell Records to sing on an album, because that was the beginning of the years of the singer/songwriter. I really didn't want to do it because that would've meant I would've had to go out and promote an album as a singer, and I didn't know how to do that... But the offer was so tempting to make a record of my songs that I treasured so much that I said yes, and that I would go out and promote the album, and the rest is, I don't know, history. I never looked back.
'The Greatest Songs Of The Fifties' is in stores now.
I may look young but I'm really a grumpy old man
by Julia Kuttner
18 February 2006
The Daily Express
(c) 2006 Express Newspapers
Barry Manilow refuses to admit that his youthful looks are the result of extensive plastic surgery but, as his new album is released, he reveals here how his zest for life is the result of a harsh upbringing
THE LATEST pictures of him don't lie. As we meet in the penthouse suite of New York's most expensive hotel, Barry Manilow, at 59, really does look freakishly young. The sumptuous setting with panoramic views of Central Park and, to the east, the Dakota building where John Lennon was murdered and the presence of his management team and record company executives are signs of just how far he has travelled in more than 30 years at the top.
And yet, at this moment, as he leans on the grand piano taking in the views from the £7,000-per-night apartment, he can almost see where he came from: the cramped Brooklyn tenement a few miles away, from which his Irish truck driver father walked out never to return when Barry Alan Pincus (as he was then) was only two.
His upbringing was left to his late mother Edna, a garment worker, who would, on more than one occasion, attempt suicide by overdosing on pills. Each time her son was there to save her. It's perhaps not surprising that, when asked, he says he never now returns to his old neighbourhood. "I come from a tenement apartment in Brooklyn where you couldn't see anything but laundry, " he says almost wistfully.
"When I visit New York I feel slightly back in touch but I don't take a drive back over there; there's just nothing left any more." We are talking the morning after another sellout show at New York's Lincoln Center jazz venue packed with long-standing fans (no singer has a more loyal following than Barry) and music business bigwigs. Tracks from his new album of Fifties songs were mingled with Manilow classics including Could It Be Magic, Mandy and Can't Smile Without You all performed with an energy and passion that shows no sign of dissipating as he moves into his seventh decade this year.
And that, he claims, is the secret to his supposed eternal youth. No vigorous and punishing gym sessions for Barry; constantly performing and mixing with a young crowd is, he insists, what helps him defy the advancing years. Cosmetic surgery, of course, might have played its part.
But that's one of those subjects about which Barry is more than just cagey.
In 2003 his nose for so long his most celebrated and mocked feature appeared to have changed shape following a freak accident in which he reportedly walked into a bedroom door. It is thought that, while his nose was being rebuilt, he also had a complete upper and lower facelift.
NOW, SITTING beside him, during an afternoon spent at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, it's hard to miss the perfectly manicured nails and the skin on his hands that shows little sign of ageing.
But while his appearance may not have changed over the years, his lifestyle certainly has. The days of the Brooklyn tenement have long been superseded by the superstar mansion surrounded by the desert and red mountains of Palm Springs, California.
For most of the year you can find him performing at the Las Vegas Hilton two years ago he signed a £31million deal, thought to be a record, to perform there nightly but nothing pleases Barry more than to retreat to his home.
"There is so much noise in my life, from the band to the audience to the planes and running around. There is too much adrenaline pumping most of the time so I look forward to going home and living my life.
"Sitting in front of the fireplace, playing classical music on my stereo system and doing my crossword puzzle invigorates me so that I can go back to work full of energy.
"A lot of people in the area where I live play golf or tennis but I don't. I choose to live there for the peace and the majesty of the mountains, the sky and the weather. I never saw any of those things as a child." Barry's personal life has always been as much a subject of intrigue as his appearance. Whether or not he shares his home with a significant other is not about to be divulged.
We know little more than that there was an early failed marriage to childhood friend Susan Deixler a friendship with Karen Carpenter, and that for years there was reportedly a girlfriend in the background. But all he will say now is that he treats his band like his family.
"I have young and very brilliant musicians in my band and I'm holding on to them for dear life. Yes, I feel like their dad. I feel it's a responsibility to look after them and make sure other people hear their music." Next month sees the UK release of Barry's new album, which has already gone to No1 in the US. And if there's one place that he can be guaranteed a hit then it's probably here where he has been showered with "Manilove" since he first performed at the London Palladium in 1978.
Tell him that many of his British fans have convinced themselves that they are in relationships with him and he laughs.
HE SAYS: "The UK and I have a very odd relationship. We've had a love affair since 1978 and they tell me that once they love you in England they love you for ever. I've heard that there are longsuffering husbands in the UK that come to the concert but I don't want to take chances and look into the audience. I don't like to see regular faces I just like to look straight ahead because over the years it has scared me.
"Now and again I would look down and would be met by smiles, laughter and enthusiasm and then I'd look down again and there would be some fat guy looking at me like that [here Barry puts on a menacing expression] and, although I knew that wasn't all of the audience, it would throw me for 20 minutes.
"I couldn't come back to being the jovial performer because I'd remember the one guy looking like that. So I don't take any chances any more, I just look straight ahead." The last time he played Britain he cracked jokes about Britney Spears. Leaping around the stage he joked that he was, "Britney before the boob job", but now he wouldn't dream of including her in his wisecracking routine. "The joke doesn't work any more, " he says. "She's on her way out." He has a further link with Britain in his friendship with Simon Cowell.
This dates from the time when Simon masterminded Barry's remixing and releasing of Copacabana and Could It Be Magic in the early Nineties. Barry jumped at the chance to become involved with the hugely successful American Idol, on which Cowell is a judge. The experience, however, was not totally positive, as he was struck by the number of contestants simply pursuing fame for the sake of it.
This leads Barry to a surprising admission that is certainly at odds with his eternally youthful appearance. He muses: "If fame is your goal it's a very risky goal. Being famous for just being famous doesn't last. About 10 years ago I turned into a grumpy old man. My motto is show me something I don't know.
"Being an old fart, I hate everybody. I hate everything and I don't think there's many good songs or anything musically interesting around. I am a grumpy old man." At an age when many artists might be slowing down, Barry believes he could be at his peak. He claims that, despite it being the easiest to record, his new album, featuring such classics as Unchained Melody, Are You Lonesome Tonight and What A Difference A Day Makes, is his favourite. He reveals: "When I finished recording I lit the fire and poured a glass of wine. That was when it hit me. I thought: 'This is a beautiful album'." The record also links Barry with his past, bringing him back together with mentor and recording label boss Clive Davis, with whom he worked at the start of his career.
Barry's early days were spent in the post room of a record company. He worked his way up to an executive job, then left to become a performer, accompanying and arranging music for Bette Midler.
They performed in New York's gay bathhouses and, over the years, their relationship has endured and survived personal disagreements.
Not content with reinventing the Fifties on his new album, Barry is now considering delving into the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties as a follow up.
He is also considering a sequel to the autobiography he produced two decades ago.
BARRY SAYS: "I have tapes and tapes of recordings of my life. There are years and years of cassettes. I saved everything and now have a warehouse full of them so, little by little, I've been putting my life story on audio.
"I'm working on something that might be interesting watching the growth of this young man who becomes a little more confident.
"Now I've reached the stage where the hit records start to pop up. I'm still at the stage of playing around with the project and haven't let anybody else hear it yet but I'm so pleased I have the recordings of my family there." With that, Barry's team knock on the door to remind him he has a car waiting.
Brushing down his fine grey wool designer suit, with its unusual Celtic style pattern embroidered in red on the back, he takes a last look around the penthouse. "It's too expensive to stay here, "he says, but there's a twinkle in the still luminous blue eyes.
It is a long time since the boy from the backstreets of Brooklyn couldn't afford what he wanted but it looks like being even longer before he starts looking his age.
Topping the pop
Manilow is back at the head of the charts with a set of '50s hits he makes his own
By Mark Brown, Rocky Mountain News
February 15, 2006
The charts may belong to the likes of Mariah Carey and 50 Cent and Carrie Underwood, but not this week. Barry Manilow topped the charts again for the first time in 30 years when his new album, Greatest Songs of the Fifties, sold more than 155,000 copies and made its debut at No. 1.
It was Manilow's first time topping the album chart since 1977.
"After all the horrible reviews and jokes and putdowns, . . . I just feel like I wasn't crazy all these years for continuing to stand up for the kind of music I believe in," Manilow tells reporters by phone from Los Angeles. "I see my name up there and I say, 'Of course there's an audience out there who wants to hear this.' "
Saturday, February 4, 2006
(12-3 PM ET) NBC Radio with Ron Insana
Interview with Barry Manilow
What prompted "The Greatest Songs of The Fifties"(according to Barry) was Clive Davis who came to him with the idea,
suggesting the public may be tired of the 30's and 40's, but "no one has touched the 50's." Barry said he looked at the roster of songs that were #1 in the 50's, crawled into them and studied them, then gave it a try. Barry noted he was more influenced by the 60s. Swing was going out, Rock & Roll was going in. This stuff was in the middle.
Throughout his pop career, Barry said he really didn't look at the trend machine, didn't pay much attention to what else was going on out there, just did what felt right. Starting with "Mandy" and going to "Read 'Em And Weep," even "Weekend In New England" (a hit record that's a waltz and doesn't have the title in the song) ... he just had this small piece of the pie.
About the hurricane of success, Barry said it's kind of dangerous for new artists as nobody teaches you how to handle that; they come out with very little experience (e.g., American Idol). "People that Clive finds do have depth and craft to them. Can't say that about everything I hear on the radio, but Alicia Keys, Kelly Clarkson... they're the real deal."
As far as continuing to do what he does, Barry said he's a musician in his heart and as long as there's an audience out there, he'll be making music forever.
Barry took calls from a couple of fans (Robin, Liz). In response to Barry's latest album possibly charting at #1, Barry replied, "if that's true, then all I can say is if you live long enough, anything is possible! [The album] is full of nostalgia, but lots of young people are connecting with these songs. I think the album is just a beautiful album."
Barry also spoke about his current show at the Las Vegas Hilton (Manilow: Music and Passion). And how about a "Greatest Songs of the Sixties"...?
Barry: "Ill follow Clive's lead."
Barry Manilow Tops US Chart
by Paul Cashmere
February 7 2006
Barry Manilow is back in a big way. The 70s crooner, whose hits started to dry up two decades ago, is this week having the biggest comeback since Rod Stewart and doing it the same way. His new album 'Love Songs of the 50's' is a sure bet to debut at number one in the USA this week.
Manilow is expected to selling more than 140,000 units this week and push out Il Divo, Mary J. Blige and Jamie Foxx. It is a marvelous feat for Manilow whose last major hit, coincidentally also a cover, was 'Let's Hang On' back in 1981.
Yahoo! FinancePress Release Source: Arista
Records
Looks Like They Made It: Barry Manilow's Greatest Hits of The
Fifties
Debuts at Number One
Wednesday February 8, 1:46 pm ET
Marks the First Number One Debut in Singer's Career
NEW YORK, Feb. 8 /PRNewswire/ -- In a career spanning more than 30 years and over 75 million albums sold worldwide, Barry Manilow broke brand new ground this week when his new Arista Records album, Greatest Hits of the Fifties debuted in the Number One position on the Nielsen SoundScan charts, moving a remarkable 155,630 copies in its first week of release.
This is the first time in the singer's career that one of his albums has debuted at Number One and marks only the second time a Manilow album reached the top spot on the chart --1977's Barry Manilow Live was the first. The 29- year stretch between Number Ones is virtually unprecedented, having only been exceeded by Ray Charles and Elvis Presley, according to Billboard Magazine.
VH1 Movies
Mary J. And Jamie Are No Match For #1 Manilow
She Wants Revenge, Train and Heather Headley score solid chart debuts.
by Chris Harris
Barry Manilow sings about writing songs that make the whole world sing - the songs, he's claimed, that make the young girls cry. But this week, R&B diva Mary J. Blige might be the only one sobbing - thanks to a collection of songs that Barry didn't write.
Screen print of Billboard Top 200 chart... Note who's on first...
Daily Mail
Not just a pretty nose
by CLEMMIE MOODIE, Daily Mail 08:17am 9th
February 2006
Over the years, Barry Manilow's most prominent feature has remained unchanged. But remarkably, it seems, so has the rest of his face.
BBC News
Manilow's 50s album tops US chart
Manilow's album was released in time for Valentine's Day
Singer Barry Manilow has topped the US album charts for the first time in nearly 29 years. The Greatest Songs of the Fifties sold 156,000 copies in the week ending 5 February.
The album features songs such as Unchained Melody and Love is a Many Splendored Thing. Manilow said: "I've had some pretty amazing experiences in my career, but this one tops them all... if you live long enough, anything is possible!"
Rolling Stone
Manilow, Blige Top the Chart
Mellow crooner, R&B diva dominate Adult contemporary crooner Barry Manilow topped the chart this week with his American classics collection The Greatest Songs of the Fifties. The compilation, in the vein of Rod Stewart's successful Great American Songbook series, sold 156,000 copies, according to Nielsen SoundScan. While this marks the Brooklyn native's eighth Top Ten album on the pop chart, it is only his second Number One in a three-decade career.
Billboard 'The Greatest Songs of the Fifties' is the 31st Barry Manilow album to appear on a Billboard chart.
February 09, 2006, 10:00 AM ET Fred Bronson
UNCHAINED MELODIES:
You can't beat the songs of the '50s and no one did this week. Barry Manilow's "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties" (Arista) enters The Billboard 200 at No. 1, giving the veteran artist the second chart-topping album of his career. Manilow's only other No. 1 album was "Barry Manilow/Live," which spent one week in pole position back in July 1977.
The Times February 10, 2006
It's a miracle! Old Blow Dries is back and the whole of the US is singing
Gerard Baker
EVERY NOW AND THEN an event of genuinely startling cultural significance forces its way into our consciousness, requiring us to rethink all our assumptions, and challenging us to stand up for what we really believe. Too often we take for granted what we should truly treasure. We forget the horrors of a past we have escaped from and we underestimate the willingness of others to undo it all and take us back there.
We have witnessed one of these episodes in the last week. I'm talking, of course, about Barry Manilow.
Golden oldies get Manilow back in charts
11.02.06
By Andrew Gumbel
The king of easy listening is back. It's been 29 years since Barry Manilow last had a No 1 album, but this week he has pulled off the old magic one more time.
Manilow's new compilation of golden oldies - what else? - unexpectedly soared to the top spot in the US Billboard chart in its first week of release, to the delight of his middle-of-the-road, predominantly female audience and, no doubt, the horror of just about everyone else.
The album title says it all: The Greatest Songs of the Fifties. The tracks - Are You Lonesome Tonight?, Beyond the Sea, Unchained Melody - are tried, true and indestructibly safe.
But no matter: Manilow's eyes are still blue. His hair and face, even at the age of 62, have a Cliff Richard air of eternal youth. And he still holds that microphone up to his mouth like a man whispering his most intimate secrets to a cherished lounge cushion.
Barry Manilow can smile again
Date published: 2/12/2006
By HELEN KENNEDY
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
After 29 years, Barry Manilow is back at the top of the charts. The campy crooner shouldered out the likes of Mary J. Blige, Jamie Foxx and Eminem to land at the top of the Billboard chart with his new album of covers, "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties." The new album sold 156,000 in its first week. It was Manilow's first No. 1 debut. "I swear, if you live long enough, anything is possible!" he said in thanking the fanilows who put him back on top.
Manilow tops pop chart with love standards
Bruce Ward, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: Saturday, February 11, 2006
Ladies, prepare to be romanced. Gentlemen, start your blow dryers. Barry Manilow is back on top. Manilow's new album of love songs from 50 years ago has debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard pop chart this week, zooming past hip-hop stars, foul-mouthed rappers, and venerable rockers U2. It is Manilow's first No. 1 album in nearly 29 years, making it a cultural phenomenon of sorts. Only Elvis Presley managed a similar feat, but Elvis had to die first to boost sales.
Manilow: From Mailroom To Marquee
Feb. 12, 2006
(CBS) What Valentine's gift is beyond the most romantic fantasy of any Barry Manilow fan?
How about Barry serenading the fan with "I Made It through the Rain"?
Thirty years later, the song is as beautiful as ever.
Or how about "I Write the Songs"?
Talk about longevity. Rita Braver caught up with Barry and asked him if he ever thought his life would be this good?
http://www.undercover.com.au/news/2006/feb06/20060207_barrymanilow.html/
Barry Manilow Tops US Chart
by Paul Cashmere
February 7 2006
Barry Manilow is back in a big way. The 70's crooner, whose hits started to dry up two decades ago, is this week having the biggest comeback since Rod Stewart and doing it the same way. His new album Love Songs of the 50's' is a sure bet to debut at number one in the USA this week.
Manilow is expected to selling more than 140,000 units this week and push out Il Divo, Mary J. Blige and Jamie Foxx.
It is a marvelous feat for Manilow whose last major hit, coincidentally also a cover, was `Let's Hang On' back in 1981.
Manilow started his career writing and performing advertising jingles. He once sang the ads for Kentucky Fried Chicken, Dr Pepper and McDonalds.
In 1971, he accepted a job as musical director for Bette Midler and toured New York's gay bathhouses with the Divine Miss M as well as playing on her first two albums.
In 1973, he signed with Bell Records, then the home of Tony Orlando & Dawn and the Partridge Family. Bell folded and became part of Arista Records which is how Manilow became involved with record guru Clive Davis. It was Davis who suggested he cover the song `Brandy' by Scott English. Manilow changed it to `Mandy'. It became his first global hit.
By 1978, Manilow was a superstar. His album `Even Now' sold more than 3 million units that year and featured the hits Can't Smile Without You' and `Copacobana'.
The tracklisting for `Greatest Songs of the Fifties' is"
1. Moments To Remember
2. It's All In The Game
3. Unchained Melody
4. Venus
5. It's Not For Me To Say
6. Love Is A Many Splendored Thing
7. Rags To Riches
8. Sincerely/Teach Me Tonight (Duet with Phyllis McGuire)
9. Are You Lonesome Tonight?
10. Young At Heart
11. All I Have To Do Is Dream
12. What A Diff'rence A Day Made
13. Beyond The Sea
http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=10:qaug6j757180
All Music Guide
Greatest Songs of the Fifties
Barry Manilow
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
A kind of a variation on Clive Davis' wildly successful American Classic Songbook albums for Rod Stewart, The Greatest Songs of the Fifties finds Barry Manilow singing vocal pop favorites of the Eisenhower era. Although there are songs that are indeed classics of the rock & roll era, there is no rock & roll here. Manilow has picked songs like "Venus," "Are You Lonesome Tonight?," "All I Have to Do Is Dream," and "Unchained Melody" (which originated in the '50s, but the Righteous Brothers had the biggest hit with it in 1965), which were on the pop crossover side of rock & roll in the latter half of the '50s. These are complemented by pop standards - such as "It's Not for Me to Say," "Sincerely/Teach Me Tonight," "What a Diff'rence a Day Made," "Beyond the Sea" - on an album that, in terms of repertoire, would not be out of step with the MOR pop LPs Mitch Miller produced at Columbia in the '50s and '60s. Of course, The Greatest Songs of the Fifties is a 2006 release, so it has a slick, semi-synthesized sheen and a warm, hazy glaze of nostalgia which, truth be told, isn't all that far removed from Manilow's big hits of the '70s, when Barry was romanticizing the Copacabana and doing big-band medleys on-stage. Given this, it shouldn't be a shock that Barry comes across as a slick, accomplished professional on these songs, never doing anything surprising but never resorting to hammy shtick, either, the way that Rod occasionally does on his songbook albums. That said, Greatest Songs isn't as rich musically as Rod's records, primarily because Manilow doesn't collaborate with an outside arranger here, or even many other producers: as the back cover says, "all song layouts created by Barry Manilow," and he keeps this within the realm of a nostalgic supper club revue. He does it well and he does it professionally, which will certainly make this record pleasing to his fans, but the record is just a shade too predictable (but never unpleasant) for listeners who aren't already firmly within Manilow's camp.
NY Post - Jan. 25, 2006
Cindy Adams
Manilow is hip to the Fifties Sound
January 25, 2006 -- BARRY Manilow, out the 31st with his new album, "The Greatest Songs of the Fifties," says: "It all came about eight months ago when Clive Davis came to me and said he had this hit idea. And it was brilliant. And I plan to do so much promotion for it that I'll even do an interview on the Weather Channel."
Barry was phoning from his "ridiculously overkill 15,000-square-foot suite at the Hilton in Vegas where I overlook mountains, sky, neon, whatever. Y'know, this is really great, but I'm not into this. My life is filled with so much noise - music, airplanes, people. I live in Palm Springs, not for the tennis and golf and climate, but for the peace and quiet. I like to get up at 6, feed my two Labs, take them for a walk, go online, read the columns.
"I'm sort of simple. I have a lovely home, but I'm not really into big cars and big houses. With my first money ever, I bought a music computer. That's what I love to do. Be in a little room with a synthesizer and the instruments that make music. I'm now an old fart."
So what's he doing in Vegas? "Starring. Can you believe, my voice is better than ever? Better even than my days in Brooklyn. Must be the genes. And I never think about it. I don't get nervous before a show. I don't worry about my voice. S - - -, I don't even do warm-ups or exercise. And they're all loving me. At my age to have this is unbelievable."
About the album, which Clive was to introduce last night at Lincoln Center, he says: "I started studying the '50s music. With any project, I do my homework. When I produced Liza Minnelli I bought every record she ever sang, in every key, in every city. Same when I worked with Dionne and Bette. So for this I got stacks of '50s CDs, played them in my car, bought the lead sheets, played them on the piano. I studied. The music is beautiful. So innocent.
"My career really began in the '60s, although I knew this '50s sound . . . 'What a Difference a Day Makes,' 'Love Is a Many Splendored Thing,' 'All I Have to Do Is Dream.' How can't you love all that?
"There's a great deal of talent around. I don't really connect with today's hip-hop rap stuff, but I recognize the ability behind it. What can I tell you, I'm more into Gerry Mulligan and Sarah Vaughan."
News articles from 2005 and 2004
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