js There is a lot of confusion surrounding Henry Mancini’s first two albums, at first glance it would seem the second album was a re-issue of the first, but this is not the case. Although Mancini was already well-known for his contributions to popular soundtracks like “Peter Gunn”, he didn’t release his first album until 1957. That album, “Driftwood and Dreams”, was a well received exotica masterpiece, but it was recorded in mono just a year or two ahead of the advent of stereo. In 1959 Mancini decided to gather the same musicians and play the same tunes with the same arrangements, but this time in stereo. The resultant album, “The Versatile Henry Mancini” is so similar to “Driftwood” that for years people have assumed it was just a stereo re-mix of the original album, not an entirely new performance. To add to all this you can now purchase both of these early albums on one CD called confusingly enough, “The Versatile Henry Mancini” ..again. All that aside, this review is written using a near pristine vinyl LP copy of “The Versatile Henry Mancini” (1959) that was found in a thrift store for a bargain.

This is probably one of the finest exotica albums you will find outside of Les Baxter’s early albums. This is exotica without all the extra cute kitsch nonsense; no fake bird calls, relentless bell trees or canned thunder in the background, just really nice arrangements that come from the west coast cool jazz tradition, but spiced up with wordless vocals and shimmering Hammond organ tones. Mancini is the master of tone color and orchestration and his choice of Hammond organ, accordian, and bass guitar, plus master jazz guitarist Laurindo Almeida and the mysterious soprano vocals of Louie “Lulu” Jean Norman (future singer of the “Star Trek theme) makes for sublime sounds. There is just enough reverb now and again that sometimes this music almost borders on some kind of proto-psychedelia. Lou Maury's thin organ sound that swoops in and out of the mix may remind some of a style that jazzer Larry Young will later use in the 70s when he becomes a psychedelic fusion player. There is no doubt that Brian Wilson was influenced by Mancini’s work when he started his “Pet Sounds” projects. Its interesting to note that despite their square reputation, the easy listening composers were ahead of the rock crowd by almost 15 years (Les Baxter’s first exotica masterpiece came out in 1951) when it came to manipulating sound and using stereo effects to their fullest.

If you like good quality exotica music, or just west coast Polynesian jazz gone Star Trek, you will love this. There are no embarrassing gimmicks or heavy-handed trendy tikisms to be found here, just some really good music that sounds like it came from "another world”.