Dino: The Essential Dean Martin

Performer: Dean Martin
Producer: Lee Gillette; Voyle Gilmore; Jimmy Bowen; Lee Gillette; Voyle Gilmore; Jimmy Bowen; Frank Collura (Compilation)
Distributor: EMI Music Distribution

Notes: Personnel: Dean Martin (vocals). Liner Note Authors: Dean Martin; Deana Martin; Steven Van Zandt; Gail Martin Downey. Dino: The Essential Dean Martin is an attempt by Capitol Records to fill up a single CD to the brim (30 tracks in nearly 78 minutes) with Dean Martin hits in the manner of the Beatles' 1. It's a welcome development from a label that was previously content to survey the same territory on the 1998 collection Greatest Hits: King of Cool, which contained only 16 tracks and ran less than 50 minutes. Martin put 36 recordings in the pop singles charts between 1949 and 1969, and 23 of them are found here. Of the four Top 40 hits not included, the most notable is the 1964 version of "You're Nobody Till Somebody Loves You." The collection does include the 1960 non-hit version of that song instead, a decision that probably was made to reduce the number of essentially similar arrangements heard on Martin's '60s singles for Reprise Records. After he hit number one with "Everybody Loves Somebody" in 1964 using a '50s rock & roll-style triplet rhythm he repeated the same approach several more times ("The Door Is Still Open to My Heart," "Send Me the Pillow You Dream On") before moving on to a pop-country style in such hits as "Houston." The compilers have broken up the same-sounding tracks with inventive sequencing, but reducing the repetition by one must have seemed like a good idea. Before the listener gets to this final phase in Martin's hit-making career, however, there is the long stretch of '50s hits, many of them with an Italianate tone (and not a few Italian lyrics). The disc's long running time allows space for quite a lot of this material; it takes up two-thirds of the album. The compilers have included a few tracks that were hits only in the U.K., plus a couple of Martin classics that were not actually chart items: his renditions of "Just in Time" from the film version of Bells Are Ringing and "Ain't That a Kick in the Head," a song he sang in Ocean's 11. By sticking to a core of major U.S. hits and adding some key elements, the collection makes for an outstanding single-disc treatment of Martin's best-known recordings. ~ William Ruhlmann Nearly a decade after Dean Martin's death, the crooner's fans were finally given the definitive Dino collection. While there was already a two-disc summation of Martin's Capitol recordings, as well as several compilations of his Reprise material, the single-disc, 30-track DINO: THE ESSENTIAL DEAN MARTIN contains a generous selection of the best of his work, culling from both labels' vaults. Steubenville, Ohio's favorite son became a singing star in the 1950s, mostly by virtue of his smooth, easy charm, apparent both in his vocal style and his public image. That charm is crystallized here--the South American lilt of "Sway;" the spare, countryish "Memories Are Made of This" (not insignificantly covered later by Johnny Cash); the laissez-faire swing of "Ain't That a Kick in the Head"--it all bespeaks an uncommon coolness that was Martin's to burn. DINO: THE ESSENTIAL DEAN MARTIN catches all of his best-known tunes, from the aforementioned gems to the perennial Reprise-era sing-along "Everybody Loves Somebody," but it fills in the spaces between with lots of equally lovable tracks, or did you think Glen Campbell had the patent on "Gentle on My Mind?"

Dean Martin was a towering pop-culture icon of the 20th century. He first became known as part of a wildly successful music-and-comedy team with Jerry Lewis in the 1940s and '50s, subsequently becoming a solo singing star. His mellow, Bing Crosby-inspired crooning style lent itself well to everything from Italian ballads to pop standards and even C&W material. As part of Frank Sinatra's notorious Rat Pack, he took part in numerous films and concerts with Sinatra and Sammy Davis, Jr. A major presence in movies, and on TV, radio, and records up to the 1970s, Martin was one of the most recognizable faces in America. He had been in retirement from show business for several years when he died in 1995 at the age of 78.

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