Search - Louis Prima, Sam Butera :: Angelina

Here Comes the Bride

Hugh Sherry | stanhope nj | 11/14/2008

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Most of the live and studio Louis Prima albums available today really give you a feel for what it was like to witness the slick lounge act so popular in Vegas for so many years.



So what make this collection different?



Imagine that you were able to hire Louis to play at one of your Italian family celebrations. A 'sandwich' wedding. A christening. A 25th or 50th wedding anniversary. Held at the firehouse or the Knights of Columbus. Remember plastic covered banquet tables with pitchers of beer, birch beer, and maybe homemade red wine. The room thick with smoke from Parodis or Di Nobles. A million little kids running around rasing hell unattended.



And up on the bandstand (if the room had one, otherwise right on the floor) Louis and his band playing all the old Italian favorites, not in the breakneck shuffle tempo of their polished lounge act. Rather, the slower, almost march-like tarantell beat. Lyrics sung mostly in english, but sometimes in Sicilan dialect, occasionaly risque.



To me this album represents the music of an Italian American family gathering of another day, when a DJ was someone you listened to on the radio.



If you'd like a really great nostalgia trip, download this one."