Frank Sinatra - "In The Wee Small Hours" Vinyl, Album, LP, 1955/2009 (Capital)

This, I believe, is the first full-length Frank Sinatra album that I purchased in 1986. As a man who was in his 30's, it seems liked the right moment or time to get into the blue funk of Sinatra at the time. Sinatra, I believe, or at the very least, one of the first artists to use the album format as a theme piece or dare I say it, the concept album. Being a sad boy/man, I was immediately drawn to Sinatra's skills as a ballad singer. In other words, these recordings, especially this album "In The Wee Small Hours" is my version of the goth album. 

I re-lived my entire romantic life at that point and time with this album. The disappointments of love have never been expressed in such highly poetic and brutal terms before my ears. The album cover fully reveals what's inside the packaging, which is 16 songs of begging and acknowledging being on the losing side of a sexual/romantic relationship. "Can't We Be Friends" is the ultimate song of a partner just grasping any straws of hope that somehow you can still be part of someone's life. We can gather that this is not going to be the case. Failure lurks on this album like a cheap after-shave lotion. 

Sinatra had the knack of getting right into the emotion or the physical pleasure of being in love or with a loved one. Through his vocals, he was a sonic poet, and here he had his brilliant arranger Nelson Riddle adding spices and elements of Wagner like heights to Sinatra's series of pleadings and reporting of love gone wrong or gone. There are no bad cuts on this album. Sinatra took the great American Songbook and cherry-picked the brilliant songs that make this album. The one song I play over and over again is the great Duke Ellington song "Mood Indigo." Perfection was never so painful to hear. Yet, it pleases the troubled soul.

Tracklist Hide Credits

A1	In The Wee Small Hours Of The Morning Composed By – David Mann (3)Written-By – Bob Hilliard	3:00
A2	Mood Indigo Composed By – Barney Bigard, Duke EllingtonWritten-By – Irving Mills	3:30
A3	Glad To Be Unhappy Written-By – Rodgers & Hart	2:35
A4	I Get Along Without You Very Well Composed By – Hoagy CarmichaelWritten-By – Jane Brown Thompson	3:42
A5	Deep In A Dream Composed By – Jimmy Van HeusenWritten-By – Eddie DeLange	2:49
A6	I See Your Face Before Me Composed By – Arthur SchwartzWritten-By – Howard Dietz	3:24
A7	Can't We Be Friends? Composed By – Kay SwiftWritten-By – Paul James (4)	2:48
A8	When Your Lover Has Gone Songwriter – E. A. Swan*	3:10
B1	What Is This Thing Called Love? Songwriter – Cole Porter	2:35
B2	Last Night When We Were Young Composed By – Harold ArlenWritten-By – E.Y. Harburg	3:17
B3	I'll Be Around Songwriter – Alec Wilder	2:59
B4	Ill Wind Composed By – Harold ArlenWritten-By – Ted Koehler	3:46
B5	It Never Entered My Mind Written-By – Rodgers & Hart	2:42
B6	Dancing On The Ceiling Written-By – Rodgers & Hart	2:57
B7	I'll Never Be The Same Songwriter – Frank Signorelli, Gus Kahn, Matty Malneck	3:05
B8	This Love Of Mine Songwriter – Frank Sinatra, Henry Sanicola, Sol Parker	3:35