Your favorite lesser-known Bacharach/David favorites

Rudy

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We are all pretty much familiar with "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head," "Walk On By," "(They Long To Be) Close To You" and "I Say A Little Prayer," but there are dozens of songs written by the Bacharach/David songwriting team. I'm sure we all have favorites among those lesser known tracks. Which brings us to this thread--list some of your lesser-known favorites! I won't say list a top five or top ten, as we often tend to stretch the lists as we start discussing things. :wink: But, don't list everything since that kind of defeats the purpose!

It is good to list the songs, but if you have a favorite interpretation of it, include the artist or band here also.

For those who don't know the Bacharach/David songbook all that well, this is a great opportunity to learn more about their completely body of work together.
 
I have several favorite lesser known Bacharach songs one is PAPER MACHE i first heard that one as an instrumental by moog synthesizer artist Christopher Scott. I loved that version along with his Switched on Bacharach album i also have versions of it by Dionne Warwick. Ronnie Aldrich. And Floyd Cramer. I also like the instrumental tracks from the Soundtrack of The Dudley Moore movie "ARTHUR " the whole B side has instrumental versions of the vocal tracks on side A
 
Speaking of Arthur (the soundtrack), there is an instrumental song on the Arthur 2 soundtrack that I like a lot, called "The Best of Times." There is some impressive sax and trumpet work on that song.

Another favorite of mine is "Everybody's Out of Town," which was released by B.J. Thomas as a followup to "Raindrops," but I don't think it made much chart noise. It's kind of an odd arrangement, but it really has that homey charm working on it. Another song that fits that category is "Hasbrook Heights," from Burt's solo self-titled album. That one is probably my favorite of Bacharach vocals.

I'm also a huge fan of the song "The Balance of Nature" on Living Together. Tony Middleton sings lead on this and he has a very Burt-like voice.

Actually I have quite a few favorites that would fall into the more obscure category. Top of the list would probably be "And the People Were With Her," from the self-titled album, and "There is Time," from Woman. Also "Pacific Coast Highway" and "April Fools" from the self-titled album. Oh I might as well say it, pretty much all the songs from that album are terrific.
 
I've had a Dionne Warwick playlist running this afternoon, so I'll add some of my favorites she's done. As Bacharach and David worked more with Warwick over the years, they would write specifically for her, and as such, it was some of their most challenging material. Some of my favorites are from that part of their working relationship.

"Odds and Ends" -- a non-album track, from what I understand. Great line in the chorus: "Just an empty tube of toothpaste, and a half-filled cup of coffee...".

"Here I Am" -- One of the most "sultry" songs they'd ever written.

"Whoever You Are, I Love You" -- from the Broadway production Promises, Promises. Great lyrics on this one, given its brevity. "From moment to moment, you're two different people. Someone I know as the man I love, or the man I wish I never knew." The whole song works around this premise of good vs. bad. And, it works well outside the context of the stage production.

"This Empty Place" -- An early Dionne track I like.

"Checkout Time" -- Dionne never liked this song, but it is a good one about a failed relationship.

"Paper Maché" -- Kind of a "cute" song but with some sort of social message buried in it.

"Are You There With Another Girl?" -- This has to be the most "suspicious" song they ever penned together. :wink:
 
Another favorite of mine is "Everybody's Out of Town," which was released by B.J. Thomas as a followup to "Raindrops," but I don't think it made much chart noise.
That's a good one! I had the album that track is from and recall liking it a bit. He had another tune that I like: "Send My Picture to Scranton, P.A." Similar quirky arrangement, but it works well behind the song. I believe it was on the same album.

I remember now, there's another track I liked. I had to check to see who wrote the lyrics--it was Hal David, so it qualifies. :wink: "Look In My Eyes, Maria" by Jay & The Americans. It's catchy, and despite it being an earlier tune, all of Bacharach's signature songwriting elements are on there.

Oh, and "Don't Go Breaking My Heart" might be known among a lot of us in A&M-land, but it's definitely a lesser-known Bacharach/David piece in the grand scheme of things.
 
I wasn't sure if "All Kinds of People" was a hit or not -- didn't it get a Dionne Warwick recording? I forgot about "I Might Frighten Her Away." That trumpet coda on the Living Together version is my favorite part of it. That's what I get for relying on my memory instead of looking at the song lists.
 
I forgot about "Are You There (With Another Girl)" too. That's one I first heard on a Billings MT middle-of-the-road station when it first came out. They would play a lot of Burt, Sergio, Herb, Sandpipers and such. (I first heard Sergio's "After Sunrise" on that same station - the DJ intro'd it as "After Morning" by mistake.)

I also have to include "Make It Easy On Yourself" (from the album of the same title) and "This House Is Empty Now" from the Elvis Costello/Burt collaboration, Painted From Memory. Two of the saddest songs ever written IMHO.
 
Mentioned in the other thread, "Who Is Gonna Love Me?" by Dionne Warwick. I'll mention "To Wait For Love" by Herb Alpert, and I'm going to add "South American Getaway" from the BUTCH CASSIDY soundtrack.
 
I also want to mention "Nikki" from Burt's self titled Album written for his daughter and was for a time used as the theme music For ABC's Movie Of The week. With a different arrangement.
 
What's interesting to me is how much my tastes have changed over the years. When I first started listening to Bacharach, my favorite cuts were instrumental, uptempo songs. Upon first hearing, I was disappointed with his version of "One Less Bell to Answer" because I didn't like Cissy Houston's vocals (and I didn't like black female vocalists in general). Now, some of my favorite songs are the ones with the vocals (including "One Less Bell"), and I like most of the slow tunes as much as the fast ones. Who says you can't teach an old dog new tricks?

Another favorite that hasn't been mentioned is "Walk the Way You Talk," which was nicely done by Sergio Mendes on his (non'A&M) Love Music album, and was done instrumentally by Bacharach on Living Together. I tend to like Sergio's version the best -- I first heard it as the B-side to the "Love Music" single.

I also can't believe I failed to mention "Something Big," which is one of my favorite songs by any artist ever. I love the way it sounds kind of like it's a rehearsal or demo at the beginning but by the end it's built up to this big orchestral crescendo. Great piece of work.
 
Something Big and The Balance of Nature from "Living Together" was mentioned here another one i Like is Burt's vocal on the Theme From Lost Horizon. And the instrumental Monterrey penninsula. The latter i think was a pretty contemporary sounding tune for its time.
 
Long Ago, Tomorrow
Come and Get Me
So Long Johnny

I have to thank @JMK for introducing me to Bacharach/David's songs on the PROMISES, PROMISES soundtracks. Favorite lesser-known tunes there are "Half As Big As Life" and "You'll Think Of Someone" (alongside the bigger hits of "Promises, Promises", "Knowing When To Leave" and "I'll Never Fall In Love Again").
 
"My Little Red Book" as performed by Love, featuring Arthur Lee, whose solo album 'VINDICATOR' came out on A&M in 1972 .


JB
 
Always partial to his instrumentals, particularly "Nikki" and "Monterrey Peninsula." I like Barbi Benton's cover of "My Little Red Book" and Naked Eys' "Always Something There To Remind Me." too.

--Mr Bill
 
I believe most of the instrumentals were by Bacharach alone, not with Hal David.
As were most (if not all) of the songs from Futures, or the Costello collab album, so I have refrained from listing those myself. They'd make some good additional threads here, though. :wink: His work with Hal David is probably his most important and influential body of work, but there are still plenty of highlights from beyond that working relationship.
 
I never knew (until recently) that Burt/Hal were responsible for something as tackily-UN-"p.c." as, a song called: ME JAPANESE BOY(!).
Also, THE OLD FUN CITY (from B.C.&S.K.) sounds very much like something which wasn't used on the Casino Royale soundtrack.
 
A lot of my favorites have already been mentioned, but here are a few others that I don't think have yet:

Be True To Yourself (Bobby Vee)
Don't You Believe It (Andy Williams)
Fool Killer (Gene Pitney)
I'm A Better A Man (For Having Loved You) (Engelbert Humperdinck)
In The Land Of Make Believe (Dusty Springfield/Dionne Warwick)
To Wait For Love (Tony Orlando)
Twenty Four Hours From Tulsa (Dusty Springfield/Gene Pitney)
You'll Never Get To Heaven (If You Break My Heart) (Dionne Warwick/The Stylistics)

I'm not sure if these two count as "lesser known" since they both were covered many, many times back in the day, but you don't hear much about them anymore and they rarely show up on Bacharach compilations:

Any Day Now
Wives and Lovers
 
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