12 Songs (Randy Newman album)

June 2025 12 Songs studio Randy Newman RandyNewman12Songs.jpg yes 1970 4 AmericanaPerone 2012 57 roots rockRandy Newman: still biting, still brilliant Christian Butler 6 November 2016 Spiked https://www.spiked-online.com/2015/11/06/randy-newman-still-biting-still-brilliant/ rock and rollRandy Newman Sheffield Rob The New Rolling Stone Album Guide 2004 Simon & Schuster 4th Brackett Nathan Hoard Christian 0-7432-0169-8 561–562 29:51 Reprise Lenny Waronker Randy Newman 1968 Randy Newman Live 1971 12 Songs is the second studio album by American singer-songwriter Randy Newman, released in April 1970 by Reprise Records.Strong 2004 1077–78 It features a swampy style of roots music with introspective, satirical songwriting.Perone 2012 57 "Have You Seen My Baby?", the album's only single, was released in May.Strong 2004 1077–78 When 12 Songs was first released, it was well received and has since garnered retrospective acclaim from critics such as Robert Christgau and Rolling Stone, both of whom cite it as one of the best albums of all time.http://www.robertchristgau.com/get_gl.php?g=A%2B Grade List: A+ Robert Christgau 2012-09-03 Music and lyrics According to Q, 12 Songs demonstrated Newman's eccentric mix of traditional pop song structures and his sardonic, satirical humor.Review: 12 Songs Q London 125 2000 AllMusic's Mark Deming said although his sense of humor seemed more caustic than on his self-titled debut album, Newman's "most mordant character studies" on 12 Songs "boast a recognizable humanity, which often make his subjects both pitiable and all the more loathsome."Deming Mark http://www.allmusic.com/album/12-songs-mw0000652508 12 Songs - Randy Newman AllMusic. Rovi Corporation 2012-09-03 In the opinion of Robert Christgau, American songwriting in general is often "banal, prolix, and virtually solipsistic when it wants to be honest, merely banal when it doesn't", but Newman's truisms on the album are "always concise, never confessional", and unique: "Speaking through recognizable American grotesques, he comments here on the generation gap (doomed), incendiary violence (fucked up but sexy), male and female (he identifies with the males, most of whom are losers and weirdos), racism (he's against it, but he knows its seductive power), and alienation (he's for it). Newman's music counterposes his indolent drawl—the voice of a Jewish kid from L.A. who grew up on Fats Domino—against an array of instrumental settings that on this record range from rock to bottleneck to various shades of jazz. And because his lyrics abjure metaphor and his music recalls commonplaces without repeating them, he can get away with the kind of calculated effects that destroy more straightforward meaning-mongers."Christgau Robert Robert Christgau 1981 Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the '70s Da Capo Press 0306804093 277 As with all of Newman's early albums, several of its songs had been previously recorded by other artists. In this case, "Mama Told Me Not to Come" had originally been recorded in 1967 by Eric Burdon, and that same year the Beau Brummels released their version of "My Old Kentucky Home". Three other songs originally appeared in versions by other artists just a few months prior to the LP release of 12 Songs: "Yellow Man" by Harry Nilsson on his February 1970 album Nilsson Sings Newman; "Have You Seen My Baby" by Fats Domino (as a 1969 single); and "Let's Burn Down the Cornfield" by Lou Rawls (the B-side to his 1970 R&B hit "You've Made Me So Very Happy"). Critical reception AllMusic 5 5 Christgau's Record Guide A+Christgau Robert Robert Christgau 1981 Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies Ticknor & Fields 089919026X Consumer Guide '70s: N https://www.robertchristgau.com/get_chap.php?k=N&bk=70 March 8, 2019 robertchristgau.com Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies The Encyclopedia of Popular Music 4 5Larkin 2006 186 The Great Rock Discography 8/10Strong 2004, p. 1077 Music Story 5 5n.d. Discographie http://www.music-story.com/randy-newman/discographie Music Story fr https://web.archive.org/web/20090511160652/http://www.music-story.com/randy-newman/discographie May 11, 2009 dead MusicHound Rock 3.5 5Okamoto David Graff Gary Durchholz Daniel MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide second 1999 Visible Ink Press Detroit 1578590612 812 Randy Newman NME 6/10NME NME London February 14, 2000 42 Q 5 5 The Rolling Stone Album Guide 5 5 The Village Voice A+ 12 Songs received positive reviews from contemporary critics. According to Keith Phipps from The A.V. Club, Newman "began to gather a following beyond critics and fellow songwriters" with the album.Phipps Keith October 8, 2003 https://www.avclub.com/randy-newman-1798208294 Randy Newman The A.V. Club Chicago February 24, 2013 Rolling Stones Bruce Grimes gave it a rave review when it was released, hailing the album as "the full emergence of a leading innovator in rock and roll".Grimes Bruce 12 Songs April 16, 1970 55 46 https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-album-reviews/12-songs-247759/ Rolling Stone 2018-11-27 In The Village Voice, Christgau called it the best record of 1970, finding the songwriting, production, and performances superior and "more accessible than the great-but-weird album that preceded it".Christgau Robert Robert Christgau April 23, 1970 http://www.robertchristgau.com/xg/cg/cg9.php Consumer Guide (9) The Village Voice New York 2012-09-03 Years later in Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies (1981), Christgau called 12 Songs "a perfect album". Deming later said it was Newman's "first great album, and ... still one of his finest moments on record." Yahoo! Music's Dave DiMartino observed some of Newman's "best-known earlier material" on the album, which he felt featured "a stellar trio of guitarists, including Ry Cooder, Clarence White and (The Beau Brummels) Ron Elliott."DiMartino Dave http://music.ca.launch.yahoo.com/read/review/12052949 Randy Newman Reviews Yahoo! Music. Yahoo! 2012-09-03 https://archive.today/20121217205031/http://music.ca.launch.yahoo.com/read/review/12052949 2012-12-17 dead Mojo commended Newman for replacing "the orchestra with an Americana rock rhythm section", while writing that "the more conventional presentation found Newman a college audience attuned to his wry singularity".Review: 12 Songs Mojo London 116 March 2000 In 2000 it was voted number 691 in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums.All Time Top 1000 Albums Colin Larkin Virgin Books 2000 3rd 0-7535-0493-6 223 All Time Top 1000 Albums Colin Larkin In 2003, 12 Songs was ranked number 354 on Rolling Stones list of the 500 greatest albums of all time,https://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/6862/35223/45738 500 Greatest Albums of All Time: Randy Newman, '12 Songs' Rolling Stone https://web.archive.org/web/20100829025146/http://www.rollingstone.com/music/lists/6862/35223/45738 2010-08-29 November 2003 dead 2017-08-22 and at 356 in a 2012 revised list.https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-lists/500-greatest-albums-of-all-time-156826/randy-newman-12-songs-44760/ 2012 500 Greatest Albums of All Time Rolling Stone's definitive list of the 500 greatest albums of all time Rolling Stone September 9, 2019 Rob Sheffield, writing in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), cited it as the moment "where Newman got loose as a rock & roller, ditching the complex orchestrations for a bluesy, easy-swinging satire of America". Track listing All songs written by Randy Newman except where noted. Side one "Have You Seen My Baby?" – 2:32 "Let's Burn Down the Cornfield" – 3:03 "Mama Told Me Not to Come" – 2:12 "Suzanne" – 3:15 "Lover's Prayer" – 1:55 "Lucinda" – 2:40 "Underneath the Harlem Moon" (Mack Gordon, Harry Revel) – 1:52 Side two "Yellow Man" – 2:19 "Old Kentucky Home" – 2:40 "Rosemary" – 2:08 "If You Need Oil" – 3:00 "Uncle Bob's Midnight Blues" – 2:15 Personnel Musicians Randy Newman – vocals, piano Clarence White – lead guitar, B-Bender electric guitar Ron Elliott – rhythm guitar Ry Cooder – slide guitar Lyle Ritz – bass guitar, double bass Jim Gordon, Gene Parsons – drums Roy Harte, Milt Holland – percussion Al McKibbon – double bass Production Lenny Waronker – producer Jack Nitzsche – co-producer on "Let's Burn Down the Cornfield" Doug Botnick – engineer Lee Herschberg – engineer Ed Thrasher – artwork Tony Newman – cover photography References Bibliography Larkin Colin Colin Larkin (writer) The Encyclopedia of Popular Music 10 4th Oxford University Press 2006 0-19-531373-9 Perone James E. October 31, 2012 The Album: A Guide to Pop Music's Most Provocative, Influential, and Important Creations ABC-CLIO 978-0313379062 Sheffield et al. 2004 581 Nathan Brackett Christian Hoard Sheffield, Rob The New Rolling Stone Album Guide Completely Revised and Updated 4th Edition Simon & Schuster 2004 0-7432-0169-8 etal https://archive.org/details/newrollingstonea00brac Rob Sheffield Strong Martin C. Martin C. Strong The Great Rock Discography: Complete Discographies Listing Every Track Recorded by More Than 1,200 Artists Canongate U.S. October 21, 2004 1841956155 7th Further reading Courrier Kevin Randy Newman's American Dreams ECW Press 2005 1550226908 https://books.google.com/books?id=KBo8RQLpwtUC&pg=PA98 A Life Behind the Mask 98–112 September 3, 2016 Willis Ellen Ellen Willis 2011 Out of the Vinyl Deeps: Ellen Willis on Rock Music U of Minnesota Press 978-0816672820 https://books.google.com/books?id=YhvBfNXvoQoC&pg=PA104 September 3, 2016 The Sixties Child 104–06 https://archive.org/details/outofvinyldeepse00will/page/104 External links 198171 12 Songs album b64e15f7-884e-3f49-a2cf-b07894c4a624 12 Songs Category:1970 albums Category:Randy Newman albums Category:Albums produced by Lenny Waronker Category:Albums produced by Jack Nitzsche Category:Reprise Records albums