Track Listing
1. If I Were A Carpenter
2. Reason To Believe
3. Sittin' Here Lovin' You
4. Misty Roses
5. Until It's Time For You To Go
6. For Baby
7. Girl Who Stood Beside Me
8. Red Balloon
9. Amy
10. Don't Make Promises
11. Daydream
Review
Bobby Darin really isn't the most original of artists, and even if the album might sound very much like a singer-songwriter affair it is not that. Darin is just banking on the singer-songwriter emerging fashion of the day.
So almost half the songs here are by Tim Hardin and much of the other half by John Sebastian of the Lovin' Spoonful. Not that there is anything wrong with this, and in fact Darin does a great job of singing these tracks, even if the songs or even the idea for the album might not be his... his producers also represented Hardin and Sebastian, and the title track sounds uncannilly like the Hardin release which would come out some time later.
So the ugly head of producers giving Darin a track by Hardin, with the same arrangements, because they knew Darin had a following and would always be more successful rears itself. And they were right. It was a hit, and it is a great song. The album is, however slightly uneven, if competent and often interesting, however not all tracks are equally performed in terms of quality. Still, it is a pretty nice album to listen to and overall I quite liked it when I manage to ignore the ugly things behind it.
Track Highlights
1. If I Were a Carpenter
2. Reason to Believe
3. Girl Who Stood Beside Me
4. Red Balloon
Final Grade
8/10
Trivia
From Wikipedia:
In 1966, he charted with folksinger Tim Hardin's "If I Were a Carpenter". It was Darin's return to the Top 10 after a four-year absence (the single peaked at No. 8 in the US and No. 9 in the UK in 1966). The tracks leaned heavily towards songs by Hardin and John Sebastian — seven of the songs were written by these two songwriters and Darin's next album would follow a similar process.
If I were a carpenter:
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