The Four Seasons - Rag Doll

The 4 Seasons finest orginal album.

The Four Seasons were one of the few groups to survive the onslaught of the British Invasion which kicked so many early 60's USA hitmakers off the charts for good. This album shows the reason why. The amazing vocals of Frankie Valli and the Seasons, hook-filled songwriting by Bob Gaudio, inventive arrangements by Charlie Calello, and dynamic production by Bob Crewe.

This was the first 4 Seasons album to feature all original material instead of a mix of a few hits, b-sides and a lot of cover versions. It's easily the best album by the original lineup with their classic 60's "Stomp-Clap" formula tuned to perfection.

The Seasons were so hot back then that almost every song on this CD could have been released as a single, especially "Danger", "An Angel Cried" and "Huggin' My Pillow" (one of their BEST EVER recordings - and it wound up a b-side!). Unlike a lot of early rock albums that sound disjointly tossed together, the track line-up on "Rag Doll" flows well. Even the very MOR-ish "On Broadway Tonight" (recorded for a short lived variety TV show) doesn't sound bad at all because of the great group harmonies.

If you love the 4 Seasons hits and want to hear more of the same, this a excellent place to begin your collection into their deep vault of great album sides. It's still my favorite 4 Seasons album after all these years.

March 21, 2007

Maybe the best Seasons' LP ?

This is to correct the otherwise great prior review: "Rag Doll" was by no means the group's first Number One single!
And hey, BluesDuke: how about "Coming Up in the World" from the Working My Way Back to You lp?
Forever a fan! February 29, 2004

No Sad Rag Here

Unlike a lot of their earlier contemporaries, the Four Seasons took as much care, mostly, making albums as they did cutting those breathless hit singles, the title track of this album being perhaps the most sublime of the lot.

The story behind the song, in case you didn't know: A small girl in a soiled dress accosted Seasons pianist/composer Bob Gaudio at a red light while he was driving home from Manhattan and squeegeed his windshield (this was years before the squeegee kids became infamous in New York); it's said he fumbled for a dollar to give her, found he had nothing smaller than a five, and gave her the five anyway, then couldn't take his eyes off her through his rearview mirror as he entered the tunnel for home. He was so unable to get her plain, dusty appearance out of his head that he wrote a song about her when he arrived home, using this kid as a model to fashion a classic rich-boy-poor-girl love song.

Then they took it to the studio and, with producer Bob Crewe, beat Phil Spector at his own game. The "Be My Baby"-derived opening backbeat sets up an arrangement that trimmed the Wall of Sound sagaciously, as if to prove you could get that booming sound without crowding--in fact, the only instruments are: drums, glockenspiel, hand percussion, and Seasons bassist Nick Massi and guitarist Tommy DeVito, the latter playing it practically as a fourth percussion instrument. "Rag Doll" remains perhaps the most bristling love song in the Four Seasons' repertoire; and, beneath that undercrowded Wall of Sound the earnestness in Frankie Valli's voice (he sounds almost in mourning singing "When she was just a kid her clothes were hand-me-down/they always laughed at her when she came into town"), and the urgency of the Seasons' punctuating lines, tells you everything you need to know about how these guys were closer to being soul singers than their image has suggested. "Rag Doll" became their final number one hit*, it deserved to be a number one hit, and if it had to be the last time they climbed that pinnacle ("Rag Doll's" conqueror at the top of the heap: "A Hard Day's Night"), they couldn't have picked a better shot.

The single was (and remains) so overwhelming that it's easy to dismiss this album, but you shouldn't. There isn't a bad cut on this album, even if nothing measures up to "Rag Doll," not even the hit which preceded it ("Ronnie"). "Rag Doll's" followup hit, "Save It For Me," was just as adventurous an arrangement as the former, even if the organ sounds as much like a skating rink as a rock and roll instrument; "Funny Face," its flip, is a sweet ballad in spite of its rather trite lyric. And if you're handing out points for guts, hand them to the Seasons' audacious re-arrangement of "I've Got You Under My Skin," eventually a hit single. The original album did, indeed, include "On Broadway Tonight," the theme for an extremely short-lived television variety show (memory instructs it to have been aimed at competing with "The Hollywood Palace"), but it's the one song on the album that sounded dated before it finished playing (pretty much like the TV show did, in fact); its exclusion actually amplifies the album. To the reviewer who alluded thereto earlier on this page, the song did turn up as a flip side - for "Let's Hang On."

It's good to see this and the original "Dawn (Go Away)" albums back in print. It wouldn't hurt to resurrect a couple more of the Seasons' albums, either, most particularly, "Born to Wander" - with the irreplaceable "Silence is Golden" - "The 4 Seasons Entertain You" and "Working My Way Back To You," which includes the beauteous "Beggars' Parade." The Four Seasons' reputation rests forever (as well it should) on their incandescent 1962-67 singles. But they made some very engaging albums, too.

(Earlier, I said "Rag Doll" was their first number one hit, a faux pas a subsequent writer was kind enough to correct. To said writer, who commends "Comin' Up In The World" from the "Working My Way Back To You" album, I say the former is a pleasant choice but not quite up to "Rag Doll's" standard. If I had to pick anything from "Working My Way Back To You" that meets that standard, I'd have to go with "Beggar's Parade"...) June 29, 2003

100% Original

This was the first album the Seasons did that contained all self penned songs (the original albums last track was "On Broadway Tonight" which would later turn up on the b'side of "I've Got You Under My Skin"). The Seasons originally recorded the track "An Angel Cried" in the 50's as Hal Miller & the Rays. But this new version contains Frankie's most powerful vocal to date. Every track on this CD is a gem. Featuring 3 great singles "Rag Doll" "Save It For Me" & "Ronnie" and 2 B sides "Huggin My Pillow" and "Funny Face". It was a pity Bob Gaudio and Bob Crewe didn't create more albums like this for the Seasons, instead of relying on old standards and current trends like Dylan & Bacharach. November 17, 2002

Fantastic Album

I had been hearing the Seasons quite a bit on the radio over the summer, and I decided to buy the old Anthology CD from 1990. That only made me want more. So I bought an LP, and figured that even if the other songs sucked on this album, then at least I'd have "Rag Doll" and "Ronnie" and "Save it For Me". I didn't have to worry about that though because every song on this album is great. I especially think "Huggin My Pillow" coulda been a hit. I am only 16, my parents dont like Valli's music much, but me and my brother sure do. I greatly reccomend this record to any fan of the Four Seasons music. October 5, 2002

More reviews at Amazon.com ...