THE JAZZ SINGER - Neil Diamond

YEAR: 1980

LABEL: Capitol

TRACK LISTING: America, Adon Olom, You Baby, Love On the Rocks, Amazed and Confused, On the Robert E. Lee, Summer Love, Hello Again, Acapulco, Hey Louise, Songs of Life, Jerusalem, Kol Nidre/My Name Is Yussel, America (Reprise)

IMPRESSIONS: In the mid-to-late 80s, some friends and I headed to Atlantic City to see a show; I forget but I believe it was Nunsense. Anyway, Paulster was driving but for some reason he had to use his father's car instead of his own. Unfortuately, no one thought to bring tunes and the only music in the car was a single cassette tape containing Liza Minnelli's "Liza With A Z" album on one side and Neil Diamond's "The Jazz Singer" soundtrack on the other. As you can imagine, we heard both albums QUITE a few times over and over during the ride to and from Atlantic City. No one complained and if I didn't already love the albums (I did), I loved them even more now. For some reason. You'd think I'd be tired of them after that but the opposite was true. This is just a really, really nice listen.

MY FAVOURITE TRACKS: America, Love On the Rocks, Summer Love, Hello Again, Jerusalem, Acapulo

FACT SHEET: THE JAZZ SINGER soundtrack is Neil Diamond's 14th album. The film was only moderately successful and got mixed reviews but the soundtrack album became Diamond's highest selling album at over 5 million copies with three top 10 singles: "Love On the Rocks", "Hello Again" and "America". Critically the album is also considered one of Diamond's finest works.