Album Reviews: Macrodosing „Summer in the City“

Let’s try a new concept to symptomize and contextualize album reviews: Macrodosing a single aspect of one album, that is, surrounding or linking it with aspects of three others. Here we go: Lee Hazlewood’s 1968’s Something Special, his most underrated album (of a just incredibly underrated career), contains the terrific little song „Summer Night“. I’m quite sure he pinched the theme (not the music) from the Lovin‘ Spoonful’s familiar hit „Summer in the City“, available on their 1966-album Hums of the Lovin‘ Spoonful. 1968 was also the year of Hazlewood’s arguably most epic quasi-commercial project, the fabulous baroque space oddity of Nancy & Lee, featuring Nancy Sinatra, of course. And to top things off, there were more singer-songwriters in 1968 having their stab at orchestral arrangements, such as the woeful bore of Randy Newman’s debut, Randy Newman. Macrodose achieved!