Post by StevePulaski on Oct 12, 2010 17:54:37 GMT -5
Joe Pesci
Vincent LaGuardia Gambini Sings Just For You
★★
Stop and think. When actors (most notably Joaquin Phoenix, oh wait, that was a hoax) go to a music career, most don't last very long. They are usually one hit wonders if they are lucky to get a hit out off of their album. But in this case, Joe Pesci's only "hit" is the song Wiseguy which really only became a mockery more than a hit. Though out of everything on the album, Wiseguy is definitely not the worst song. It's probably the best song on the entire album next to Yo Cousin Vinny. While this is hard to believe, Joe Pesci's second album with the first being released as a Vinyl in 1968 titled Little Joe Sure Can Sing where he covered Beatles and Bee Gees songs. I've listened to a few tracks and they're not necessarily bad, just pretty pointless. Why cover a song I ask?
Joe Pesci is well known for his cut-throat acting, mobster portrayal, violent attitude, Italian accent, vulgar language, and quotable lines in movies such as Raging Bull, Casino, and the iconic Goodfellas. In 1998, Pesci retired from acting to pursue a career in the music industry and released this album the same year. The album, in a strange way, reminds me of "Weird Al" Yankovic" on how he parodies the song "If it Doesn't Snow on Christmas" to poke fun at Santa Claus. Of course Pesci is much more vulgar on the track than Yankovic has been in his whole life, so it's not really the same, but it makes for an interesting "compare and contrast" dilemma.
Let's get down to the music. It seems Joe just did this for money, like most rappers do. He doesn't spit anything memorable and just talks about the cliche topic of money, women, treating people like dirt, and being the man of it all as well as sampling lines from Fred Rogers' Won't You Be My Neighbor?. Well that describes one of his songs, Wiseguy, which is a pretty good track that does deserve recognition. It's in no way an amazing rap song, but if compared to other tracks on this CD it's definitely a highlight track. The lyrics are nothing you wouldn't hear in a Snoop Dogg track, but Joe Pesci does say something no rapper really admits; "Treat all my broads like trash." No rapper really admits to treating women like crap, so that lyric which happens in the very beginning of Wiseguy I was a bit surprised. But overall, it deserves a two and a half.
The rest of the album is hit or miss. Some songs I can sing are Yo Cousin Vinny which is probably the best song off the album. I really enjoy the first verse over the second and I am amused on how well Pesci sings on the track as well. Sure it's just an average rap song, but it goes down as the best on the album. For Pesci's first time at rapping, it's a three and a half out of four. Can't lie. But the album's worst is definitely Take This Love and Shove It. I can't stand listening to a track that's loud and just unnecessary. It seems like it could have been used after a Stone/De Niro fight in Casino. Take This Love and Shove It also uses something I really hate to listen to and it's when people direct instruments in a track. It's annoying to hear Pesci yell "Let me hear them trombones, base, etc." It's unnecessary and makes the track longer than it should be.
Speaking of making things longer, it's also hilarious that Pesci, whom probably ran out of ideas for songs, had to include bilingual versions of Yo Cousin Vinny in both Italian and Spanish to make the album have more tracks. I find that hilarious and it's the first time any artist has made their album longer by doing that. I can understand a remix, but why would I want to listen to a track I can't even understand? Common sense wasn't used. Though the Italian version is catchy and I find myself singing parts I understand while I work, it still is not needed on the album.
Three last songs I want to mention are If it Doesn't Snow on Christmas, What a Wonderful World, and I've Got News For You. If it Doesn't Snow on Christmas is a song I find tolerable and funny at parts. I do laugh some points in the track, but once more, it's just a song to forget. It's like the Bad Santa of music, it won't put you in the holiday spirit. What a Wonderful World is a song almost every singer in the history of music has did a cover for or at least sampled it in one of their songs. Its an overused song. For Pesci standards, it's decent, but it's another cover song. If the album was strictly covers I'd understand, but once more, covers are used for fillers in this album. What a Wonderful World is good, but nothing special again. I've Got News For You is another loud, obnoxious track that serves nothing more than an annoyance on the album much like Take This Love and Shove It. It's a mind numbing track that should just end the second it starts.
Vincent LaGuardia Gambini Sings Just For You is a mediocre album with Joe Pesci's name sadly stamped on the cover. It's just a rap album from a famous singer who should have thought twice. I think none less of the actor himself, after all, he was in Casino and Goodfellas, two of the greatest mobster films of all time. A rap album may have seemed like a good idea on paper, but once I heard it, I couldn't imagine Pesci wanted to continue it after a few tracks. While it's been twelve years and it's a forgotten CD, I'll listen to track one and two back to back and then turn it off sometime in the future.