Hit Parade 1953

This volume of Dynamic's year-by-year survey of American pop music is relatively restrained -- there's a little less presence of silly novelty tunes (not that some of the straight pop isn't plain silly, too), and an effort at class, if not substance. Frankie Laine's "I Believe" and Dean Martin's "That's Amore," Percy Faith's "The Song from Moulin Rouge," and Patti Page's "The Doggie in the Window" are the most obvious pop chestnuts here, well worn in many people's memories -- on the plus side are contributions from Eartha Kitt ("C'est Si Bon") and Silvana Mangano ("Anna"), that aren't heard as much as perhaps they should be (especially the Eartha Kitt track). The sound is quite good throughout and amazingly consistent. And as with all of the entries in his budget-priced series, there is no annotation. ~ Bruce Eder