[.ca] Second Album

THE ALBUM THAT KEEPS COMING BACK FOR MORE.:
As a diehard Barbra fan, it never ceases to amaze me how this record keeps morphing on me. When I first bought it (probably 1973), I couldn't get into most of the Arlen ballads and thought many of them overproduced and/or oversung. Years later, after reading consistently good reviews about it, I would begin to revisit it and found that it, or I?, had mellowed some with age and the songs began to grow on me. Now, it is one of the records I consistently play from her catalog. "Down With Love", "When The Sun Comes Out", "Any Place I Hang My Hat..", and "..Too Long at the Fair" are among Barbra's best recordings. For the life of me, I don't know why she chose to include the manic "Lover Come Back To Me" on the "Essential Barbra Streisand", but you can't have everything. "The Second Album" is great car music and helps lift the boring work blues at the office as well. Who would have guessed?

THE ALBUM THAT KEEPS COMING BACK FOR MORE.:
As a diehard Barbra fan, it never ceases to amaze me how this record keeps morphing on me. When I first bought it (probably 1973), I couldn't get into most of the Arlen ballads and thought many of them overproduced and/or oversung. Years later, after reading consistently good reviews about it, I would begin to revisit it and found that it, or I?, had mellowed some with age and the songs began to grow on me. Now, it is one of the records I consistently play from her catalog. "Down With Love", "When The Sun Comes Out", "Any Place I Hang My Hat..", and "..Too Long at the Fair" are among Barbra's best recordings. For the life of me, I don't know why she chose to include the manic "Lover Come Back To Me" on the "Essential Barbra Streisand", but you can't have everything. "The Second Album" is great car music and helps lift the boring work blues at the office as well. Who would have guessed?

My First Barbra Streisand Album:
I was 9 years old when I first heard this album. I will never forget the effect of hearing "My Coloring Book" that first time. I was with my parents visiting some friends who owned the album. I think I got my mother to take me to buy the album the next day. (...) Standouts to me are "Any Place I Hang My Hat is Home," "When the Sun Comes Out," and "Have I Stayed Too Long at the Fair." Sentimentally, this will always be an important album to me, but I think it's a superb introduction to anyone who wants to experience the early Barbra Streisand. At the time, her records, her looks, her personality, were unlike anything anyone had seen before. She was becoming a sensation that has now become a legend. I highly recommend "The Second Barbra Streisand Album."

Great album, but maybe a few more great songs:
This is a wonderfull album the songs in here highlight the greatness that is Barbra Streisand. My personal favorites are: Down with Love, a great softie which turns into a very fun jazzy upbeat song, kind of weird, because for once we don't hear her singing about how wonderful love is/ Who will buy, a great song whith an amazing vocal effort by Barbra, really much better than the one in "Oliver!"/ I satyed too long at the fair, perhaps my favorite song of her three-four early albums, this song is amazing! she fills it with so much emotion and that high note at the end is just breathtaking. But, there are a few songs like : like a straw in the wind, that are a bit confusing, and I would have hoped for two three more songs like Down with Love, or Who will buy In general, a great album, though a little bit lacking, but deffinitely worth the money!

Barbra's 60's Peak:
Forget everything that followed. Barbra was not quite yet BARBRA -- purveyor of heavily orchestrated glop and circumstance. This was the follow-up album from a 21 year-old Brooklynite who had taken the world by storm with her stunning debut album. Expectations were high, and that unmistakable giddyness still permeates this CD -- even 40 years after its initial release. Yes, the blueprint of the first (and more highly regarded) album was followed, but the sophomore slump was averted by the inclusion of no less than five wonderful Harold Arlen songs. Among these, Down With Love (along with Lover, Come Back To Me) keeps the mood light while eschewing the outright goofiness of the first album's Big Bad Wolf and Come To The Supermarket, whereas Right As The Rain (along with Who Will Buy?) echoes (and improves upon) the spare, haunting sound of its predecessor's A Taste Of Honey. Other Arlen songs are bluesy -- and surprisingly suited to Barbra's empathetic vocals. Meanwhile, I Stayed Too Long At The Fair outdoes Much More as a forthright statement of longing (and, in this case, regret), Gotta Move sizzles like crazy, and I Don't Care Much (a number cut during previews of the original production of Cabaret) delivers a gut-wrenching account of rock bottom. I grew up with Barbra in the seventies, and was never especially interested in her sixties output. Like one of the previous reviewers, this album was my entree to all that she had to offer at the start of her career. When discovering the 1st and 2nd albums (along with the Funny Girl soundtrack), you - like me - will find that Barbra was never hungrier -- or better.

• Any Place I Hang My Hat Is Home
• Right as the Rain
• Down With Love
• Who Will Buy? \oFrom the Broadway Musical Production oliver!\c
• When the Sun Comes Out
• Gotta Move
• My Coloring Book
• I Don't Care Much
• Lover, Come Back to Me
• I Stayed Too Long at the Fair
• Like a Straw in the Wind