Sleepy shores (Sounds Orchestral) (LP 456 - 458)

Sounds Orchestral Words (Vinyl, Pye, 1968) ** 

Sounds Orchestral Sounds Like A Million (Vinyl, Pye, 1969) **  

Sounds Orchestral Wigwam  (Vinyl, Pye, 1971) ***

Genre: Easy Listening

Places I remember: Graham Purdy collection

Fab, and all the other pimply hyperboles:  Wichita Lineman (Wigwam)

Gear costume:  Classical Gas, By The Time I Get To Phoenix  (both on Wigwam)

Active compensatory factors: Sounds Orchestral is actually a group, not a faceless bunch of studio hacks churning out easy listening cover versions. The drummer remained the same (Kenny Clare) and the bassist on these albums is mainly Peter McGurk (he died in 1968 and was replaced by Frank Clark for Wigwam).

Johnny Pearson on piano is the chief instigator though. His playing dominates proceedings. He's not jazz or pop oriented. At all.

The strings that drench each track are my main issue. With them the songs sometimes turn into Ricco Suave dinner music (that's how I heard these albums growing up btw - at dinner time). 

At worst it's mush, at best it's pleasant, undemanding, laid back stuff. Background music for dinner time.

Wigwam is the best of the bunch - some meatier beats and strings are down in the mix or else, in the case of Wichita Lineman, add a greater poignancy to the music. Still - the version of Something is only just tolerable.

And a final word - those covers are especially terrible!!! The packet of gold cigarettes alongside Beethoven, a man on the moon and a coke bottle? What the...???

Where do they all belong? That's nearly it for dad's stuff in the Easy Listening genre. One to go. Gird the loins.