| Lounge music | |
|---|---|
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | 1950s, United States |
| Derivative forms | |
Lounge music is a type ofeasy listening music popular in the 1950s and 1960s. This music is meant to evoke in the listeners an emotion, or the feeling of being in a place with a tranquil theme such as ajungle, an island paradise orouter space.[1] It emerged from Dixieland jazz, Latin dance, the croon, experimental music, and the gimmick song.[1] The range of lounge music encompassesbeautiful music–influenced instrumentals, and modernelectronica (withchillout anddowntempo influences), while remaining thematically focused on its retro–space age cultural elements. The earliest type of lounge music appeared during the 1920s and 1930s, and was known aslight music.[citation needed]
Exotica,space age pop, and some forms of easy listening music popular during the 1950s and 1960s are now broadly termed "lounge". The term "lounge" does not appear in textual documentation of the period, such asBillboard magazine orlong playingalbum covers, but has been retroactively applied.[citation needed]
Whilerock and roll was generally influenced byblues andcountry, lounge music was derived fromjazz and other musical elements borrowed from traditions around the world. Exotica from such artists asLes Baxter,Martin Denny,Arthur Lyman, andThe Three Suns sold millions of records during its heyday. It combined music that was popular outside the United States, such as various Latin genres (e.g.,bossa nova,cha-cha-cha,mambo as inCal Tjader's fine Latin jazz efforts),Polynesian, French, etc. into a relaxed,[2] palatable sound. Such music could have some instruments exaggerated (e.g., a Polynesian song might have an exotic percussion arrangement using bongos, and vocalists imitating wild animals). Many of these recordings were portrayed as originating in exotic foreign lands, but in truth were recorded inHollywood recording studios by veteran session musicians. Another genre, space age pop, mimickedspace age sound effects of the time and reflected the public interest inspace exploration. With the advent ofstereophonic technology, artists such asEsquivel used spatial audio techniques to full effect, creating whooshing sounds with his orchestra.
A good deal of lounge music was pure instrumental (i.e., no main vocal part, although there could be minor vocal parts). Sometimes, this music would be theme music from movies or TV shows, although such music could be produced independently from other entertainment productions. These instrumentals could be produced with an orchestral arrangement, or from an arrangement of instruments very similar to that found in jazz, or even rock and roll such as theHammond organ orelectric guitar.[citation needed]
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"Swinging" music of the era is also considered "lounge" and consisted of a continuation of theswing jazz era of the 1930s and 1940s, but with more of an emphasis on the vocalist. Soft and gentle vocalists such asFrank Sinatra,Dean Martin,Dooley Wilson,Pat Boone,Bobby Darin,Jackie Gleason,Wayne Newton,Louis Prima,Sam Butera,Bing Crosby,Perry Como,Sammy Davis Jr.,Louis Armstrong andBobby Vinton are notable examples of lounge music. Female lounge singers includeJulie London,Dinah Washington,Nina Simone,Ella Fitzgerald,Keely Smith,Peggy Lee,Sarah Vaughan,Billie Holiday,Etta James,Mrs. Miller,Lesley Gore,Rosemary Clooney andBlossom Dearie. The music ofBurt Bacharach was soon featured as part of many lounge singers' repertoires. Such artists performed mainly at featured lounges inLas Vegas casinos. Documented pioneers of the Las Vegas lounge scene, theMary Kaye Trio were first on the scene in the early 1950s.
Lounge singers have a lengthy history stretching back to the decades of the early twentieth century.[citation needed] In any event, these lounge singers, perhaps performing in a hotel or cocktail bar, are usually accompanied by one or two other musicians, and they favorcover songs composed by others, especiallypop standards, many deriving from the days ofTin Pan Alley.[citation needed]
Many well-known performers got their start as lounge singers and musicians.[quantify]Billy Joel worked in a piano bar for six months and penned the song "Piano Man" about his experience.[3]
Lounge emerged in the late 1980s as a label of endearment by younger fans whose parents had listened to such music in the 1960s. It has enjoyed resurgences in popularity in the 1980s and 1990s, led initially by figures such asBuster Poindexter andJaymz Bee. In Japan, producerYasuharu Konishi became popular for his work withPizzicato Five, and is often considered "the Godfather ofShibuya-kei," a genre mostly derived from 1960s lounge music.[4][5]
In the early 1990s the lounge revival was in full swing and included such groups asCombustible Edison,Love Jones,The Coctails,Pink Martini,the High Llamas, Don Tiki, andNightcaps. The multinational groupthe Gentle People, signed to the UK labelRephlex Records, attracted an international following and appeared on various lounge and exotica compilations.[6] Alternative bandStereolab demonstrated the influence of lounge with releases like their 1993 EPSpace Age Bachelor Pad Music and their 1997 albumDots and Loops, and in 1996 Capitol Records began issuing theUltra-Lounge series of lounge music albums. The lounge style was starkly in contrast to thegrunge music that dominated the period.[7][8] These groups wore suits and played music inspired by earlier works ofAntônio Carlos Jobim,Juan García Esquivel,Louis Prima and many others.[citation needed]
In 2004, the Parisian bandNouvelle Vague released aself-titled album in which they covered songs from the '80s post-punk and new wave genres in the style of bossa nova. Other artists have taken lounge music to new heights by recombining rock with pop, such asJon Brion,The Bird and the Bee,Triangle Sun,Pink Martini, theBuddha-Lounge series, and the surrounding regulars ofCafé Largo. The movieThe Rise and Fall ofBlack Velvet Flag (2003) is a documentary about three older punk rockers who created a lounge-punk band.[citation needed]
In 2018, Britishrock bandArctic Monkeys released their sixth studio album,Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino. The album, which was a shift in style for the band after 2013'sAM, has a more lounge pop sound rather than their previous alternative rock sound. The album is aconcept album about a hotel on the Moon (Tranquility Base is the site of the 1969Apollo 11 Moon landing) and also reflects on modern society and technology, and its effect on the human mind, with frontmanAlex Turner taking inspiration from both oldscience-fiction films and Neil Postman's 1985 book,Amusing Ourselves to Death. Their seventh studio album,The Car, also has a laid-back lounge pop sound, continuing their shift in sound to a lounge pop andbaroque pop style.[citation needed]
In the 1980 filmThe Blues Brothers, five members of the defunct Blues Brothers have formed a lounge act, Murph and the Magictones, and are found performing Latin-esque music at aHoliday Inn.[9] When the band takes a break to speak with Jake and his brother Elwood, Murph switches on a Muzak version of "Just the Way You Are," originally performed byBilly Joel, a former lounge musician himself.[citation needed] Later, when Jake and Elwood are in an elevator, Jobim's "The Girl from Ipanema" (an archetypicalelevator music tune) is heard.[10]
The 1989 filmThe Fabulous Baker Boys starredJeff Bridges,Beau Bridges, andMichelle Pfeiffer as a successful lounge act.[11]
Andy Kaufman created a character calledTony Clifton, a lounge singer. A parody of show biz entitlement and excess, Clifton is untalented, lazy (often not bothering to remember the words to the songs), and abusive to his audiences.[citation needed]
Bill Murray also portrayed a particularly bad lounge singer onSaturday Night Live,Nick The Lounge Singer,[12] best known for providing his own lyrics to theJohn Williams theme fromStar Wars and performing an over-the-top version of theMorris Albert hit "Feelings".[citation needed] Later onSNL,Will Ferrell andAna Gasteyer portrayeda goofy married duo of lounge-style musicians, but in unlikely venues such ashigh school dances. Part of the humor derived from the incongruous application of their "nerdy" and outdated style to performances of current pop-music hits.[13] British comediansMel Smith andGriff Rhys Jones appeared as a cheesykeyboard andbass duo during the end credits of one series of their long-running sketch show.[citation needed]
Richard Cheese andthe Lounge Kittens perform lounge-style arrangements of recent popular songs for comedic effect.[citation needed]
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