Pre-Owned Four Gals Sing the Hits (CD 0617742005721) by Various Artists

0617742005721. Pre-Owned: Good condition. CD. Four Gals Sing Hits combines the hits of four female vocalists who don't have enough chart items to merit their own greatest-hits collections. Many reissue producers would likely feel that, even in combination, these artists don't have enough major hits to merit this package, since only one track reached the Top Ten, and only four others attained the Top 20. Toni Arden, Peggy King, Jill Corey, and Mindy Carson all recorded for Columbia in the early to mid-'50s and were traditional pop singers aligned with the music of the pre-rock era. Several of the cuts are cover songs that competed on the charts against better-known renditions; Arden's "Kiss of Fire" isn't as well-known as Georgia Gibbs' chart-topping version, and Carson's "Memories Are Made of This" didn't sell nearly as well as Dean Martin's version. The four gals have different styles: Arden specializes in torchy ballads, King is cute and flirtatious. Carson, a veteran vocalist with more hits than appear here, arguably recorded the definitive version of "Wake the Town and Tell the People," even though her performance didn't chart as high as Les Baxter's rendition. Corey is the spiciest of the four, with a dramatic religious song ("Robe of Calvary"), a tune with cabaret flourishes ("Big Daddy"), and a couple of up-tempo numbers that feature energetic harpsichord and honky tonk piano. For collectors of chart hits, Four Gals Sing Hits is a treasure because it is the only place to find some of these low-charting singles on CD. ~ Greg Adams, Rovi