Warren Baker- William Holden presents Far Away Places

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This was a dollar.  I am a big William Holden fan.  In retrospect, I am not sure why I would buy this based on the fact that I like the actor who is on the cover.  But I did,  so here we are.IMG_5989The above scene is from Stalag 17 and is my favorite Holden moment.  According to lore, Holden was unhappy abut playing the role of Sefton due to the character’s selfish nature.  He was the third choice for the role and was under studio contract. He begged to director Billy Wilder to soften some of the edges to little avail.  Wilder finally threw Holden a bone and let him have the goodbye salute at the end of his departure.  The more I think of it,  this is one of my favorite moments in all film.

William Holden The Wild BunchMy other favorite Holden role is in Sam Peckenpah’s The Wild Bunch as gang leader, Pike Bishop.  Again, Holden was not the first choice for this role.  Lee Marvin was cast for the role but turned it down for more money to sing with Clint Eastwood in Paint Your Wagon.  Nothing against Holden, but it would have been a different movie with Marvin in command.  However,  Marvin did gain a #1 single in the UK with Wagon’s “Wandern Star”.

SunsetBoulevardWilliamHoldenFinally, William Holden’s death was immortalized in Susan Vega’s 1984 song “Tom’s Diner” (which in turn would be immortalized by 1990’s DNA remix).  Holden would die in 1981 at the age of 63 after a fall into a table.  He was intoxicated at the time.   In the song, Vega sings about reading an article in the paper about “a story of an actor / who had died while he was drinking”.

As for the album itself,  it is actually pretty good. It is a collection of exotica tunes from around the world.  Arranged by TV, film and radio composer Warren Barker (who wrote TV’s Bewitched theme), the songs fall into either an Asian(the record calls it oriental) or Latin category.  As with most exotica,  the songs are filled with strange percussion.  There are a lot of good moments including “Malayan Nightbird”, “Tokyo Trolley”, “Kyoto Merry-Go-Round” and the songs I chose for the samples.

DSCN2291For samples. I went with my go-to favorite song, “Lotus Land”.  I followed this with the latin flavored “Carnavalito”.  Finally, “Kowloon to London Express” is a heavily Asian flavored song with subtle odes to Russia and England thrown in.

This is a top rated album.  Thanks William Holden as I would not have bought this without your approval.