The Ethel Merman Disco Album

[JoizeyActor]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:38pm

I just ordered my copy, I'm SO EXCITED. Ethel Merman's big brassy vocals set to disco music. What a horrible yet wonderful idea.

Does anyone else own this treasure?

[jv92]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:42pm

No and I wouldn't if you paid me. To hear Merman sing "Everything's Coming Up Roses" to disco is about as bad as reading about her in a trailer trash biography, which I sadly did purchase not knowing it was so awful.

[Kringas]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:43pm

She thought with her vagina, though.

[JoizeyActor]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:45pm

Are you talking about the newest book that just came out about her?

[hushpuppy]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:49pm

Not willing to even think about, let alone comment upon Ethel thinking with her vagina, I will say that I am old enough to have 1) bought the EM Disco Album when it first came out on LP, 2) heard her perform 'Alexanders Ragtime Band' set to disco on the Johnny Carson show and 3) actually danced to it in a gay bar in the late 70's. Of course I bought the CD and admit to taking it with me on long car trips when I start to doze. It's a guilty pleasure.

[JoizeyActor]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:55pm

I can't wait for it to come in the mail. I"m going to bust a move to the Merm.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 4:58pm

It's absolutely HYSTERICAL!!!

Carol Channing should record one.

[JoizeyActor]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 5:05pm

Carol Channing should team up with Diddy and do a rap album in my opinion. Who did she present with at the Tonys that one time? LL Cool J? I love it.

[philcrosby]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 5:20pm

I too bought the original LP and danced to the Merm in disco's in the 70s, what a hoot. There is a hidden gem in this recording, and that is the soft, gentle intro she gives to "I Got Rhythm" (of course, after that lovely vocal with piano, all hell breaks loose!). Of course, Ethel laid her tracks down to piano only, and all the disco was added later. You've got to give her credit though, an icon keeping up with the times.

That new bio has gotten HORRIBLE reviews from all sources, a pity since a definitive, objective biography of all the contradictions that were the Merm has yet to be written.

[jimmirae]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 5:36pm

I think Hushpuppy and Philcrosby said it all for me too. Ditto. That was my era too, and I owned and danced in a Disco to La Merm. This original record gave all the more "mature" drag queens in that day something fresh to do, and seeing them dressed as EM and dancing ALL around - well, I miss those old days, we had a Ball!
P.S. Anybody recall the song "Disco Lucy"?
Grace Jones, Donna Summer and oooooh, All the rest!!!
Are there any real discoteques left? They ROCKED!
Studio 54 was always a fun night! (ALL NIGHT!)

[respeck]

Posted: 1/14/06 at 8:02pm

This is definitely the CD I use to get the party started.

Whoever has this album, skip through and listen to all the tracks for like five seconds one after another. They all start with the same beat by itself for at least a few seconds.

[miss pennywise]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 5:04am

I had the LP and now own the CD. (Actually, I still have the LP. Even though I have gotten rid of most of my vinyl, that is one of the few I saved. I just couldn't part with it.)

I think it's demented...I LOVE IT! (And I'm a straight woman!)

[Unknown User]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 7:11am

I'm with you...demented for all the right reasons. There should be more albums like this. It would make me very happy.

[respeck]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 7:36am

Beerchild! Seeing Female Trouble and The Ethel Merman Disco Album on the same page just made my century!

[Dollypop]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 9:27am

I remember seeing an episode of THE CAROL BURNETT SHOW where Merman sang "The Illusive Butterfly of Love". It was a song so inappropriate for her voice and she BELTED the damned thing.

[sidneybruhl]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 9:42am

I own this CD too and love it--it's "bad," but in a good way. Even Barbra and KISS went disco in the '70s. Why not the Merm?

[PalJoey]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 11:00am

The idea of this was a hoot and a holler, but unfortunately Ethel would have none of it--except for taking the money.

She refused to sing along with the disco orchestration--or even listen to it!

All she would agree to do is sing the songs basically the way she always sang them. The producers then mixed the disco arrangements OVER her vocals.

As a result, the finished product is less fun than it might have been. The 3 best songs are I Got Rhythm" (as Phil Crosby pointed about above), "Alexander's Ragtime Band" (as Hushpuppy pointed out) and "Something for the Boys."

[best12bars]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 11:02am

"I Got Rhythm" sounds like the Muppet Show Theme on her album. It's the worst!

The best is "There's No Business Like Show Business" for true disco cheese.

I like to play this along with the Disco Evita album... and the Ballad of Sweeney Todd Disco...

Nothing quite says Formica like that trilogy. It speaks to me.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 11:12am

Don't forget Disco Sarava!

[best12bars]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 11:21am

PJ -- I've also been dying to get my hands on "Hooked on Broadway," which I had on vinyl years ago. That had a bout 50 songs on it, like "Hooked on Classics." It was an endless disco mix of show tunes.

Nobody's released the Broadway one on CD... although there's a compilation "Hooked On..." CD with a 5-min. Broadway medley... but it ain't the same! I want the whole cheese ball!

*searching eBay*

[Unknown User]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 11:54am

Not to change the topic too much, but does anybody know for sure whether tomorrow (Jan. 16, 2006) would have been Ethel Merman's 100th, 98th, 97th, or 94th birthday? Apparently she lied about her age a lot and different sources list conflicting years.

And if it was indeed 1906, is anyone up for going over to her birthplace at 359 Fourth Ave. in Astoria tomorrow to belt out a few showstoppers? Maybe someone could bring a boombox so we could do a disco 'Everything's Coming Up Roses' for the Merm's hundredth?

[best12bars]

Posted: 1/15/06 at 12:01pm

I think it's her bicentennial.

She REALLY lied.