LIZA MINNELLI - Tropical Nights (1977-2002) APE (image+.cue), lossless

If Liza Minnelli never had much success as a recording artist, the reason may have been that she was too busy to give that aspect of her career sufficient attention. In the minds of both her audience and the record companies for which she recorded, the other areas of her career actively competed with her recording role. Consider her 1977 album Tropical Nights. Though she had been recording for Columbia Records since the Top 20 success of the Liza with a "Z" TV soundtrack in 1972, the release was her first non-soundtrack, non-cast studio album in four years, since 1973's Liza Minnelli, The Singer. It was sandwiched between her appearances in the movie musical New York, New York (which opened in June and had a soundtrack album on United Artists), and the stage musical The Act (which opened in October and had a cast album on DRG). Minnelli had no time to promote it, and Columbia had little incentive to do so for her. But even if they had, it's not clear that it would have succeeded. Minnelli dove headlong into disco and funk for the better part of Tropical Nights, much of which was written and arranged by Jim Grady. Instead of ruling over the pumping funk tracks with her emotive voice, however, she was buried in the mix, singing on the beat. Only in the last tracks on side two does the pace slow, the strings swell, and the singer step out. But that hasn't kept Tropical Nights (with its fashion-plate cover that seemed to recall her 1975 film Lucky Lady) from being as confused as it is confusing. No wonder Minnelli abandoned a recording career for years afterward. by William Ruhlmann  
Tracklist:
1 Jimi Jimi 3:59
Jim Grady
2 When It Comes Down to It 3:36
Lead Guitar [Lead On] – Steve Morse
Words By, Music By – Minnie Riperton, Richard Rudolph
3 I Love Every Little Thing About You 3:12
Band [The Steve March Band], Bass – Rex Robinson
Band [The Steve March Band], Drums – Lynn Hammann
Band [The Steve March Band], Saxophone [Saxes] – Charlie Black, Tom Yaeh
Band [The Steve March Band], Trumpet – Mark Hatch
Band [The Steve March Band], Vocals – Steve March
Performer – The Steve March Band
Written-By – Stevie Wonder
4 Easy 3:43
Jim Grady
5 I'm Your New Best Friend 3:07
Chorus [The Steve March Chorus] – Charlie Black, Chuck Wilson, Fuzzy Jacobs, Jim Grady, Mark McKinniss, Rex Robinson, Rich Cassabone, Steve March, Tom Ruben
Performer – The Steve March Chorus
Jim Grady / Dave Miller
6 Medley: Tropical Nights/Bali Ha'i 6:17
Oscar Hammerstein II / Richard Rodgers / Mark Winkler
Arranged By [Arrangement] – Jim Grady
7 Take Me Through/I Could Come to Love You 4:30
Jim Grady
8 Come Home Babe 3:27
Jim Grady
9 A Beautiful Thing 3:27
Jim Grady 

LIZA MINNELLI - The Singer (1973) Mp3

By the end of 1972, Liza Minnelli was at a career high point. That year, she had starred in the movie version of Cabaret, for which she would win the Academy Award for best actress, and she had also performed her nightclub/concert act, Liza with a "Z" for a television special that would win an Emmy as Outstanding Variety/Music Program. Both the Cabaret and Liza with a "Z" soundtrack LPs became gold records. So, when Minnelli entered the recording studio to make her first studio album for Columbia Records (following stints at Capitol and A&M), she seemed to have the potential finally to break through as a recording star. That potential, however, was squandered on the resulting LP, The Singer. Unfortunately, while Cabaret and Liza with a "Z" had been ideal showcases for Minnelli's bravura singing, dancing, and acting abilities, no one, not the artist herself or anyone in her management or record company, could come up with a comparable concept for her as a recording artist. One selection on the album, the title song "The Singer," which sounded like an outtake from Cabaret even though it had not been written by the show's songwriters, John Kander and Fred Ebb, played to her strengths as a performer. The other ten tracks, however, simply had her offering her own versions of songs that were hits in the fall of 1972 and the winter of 1973, as recorded by the likes of Mac Davis, Carly Simon, James Taylor, Bill Withers, and others. (The only exception was Stevie Wonder's "You Are the Sunshine of My Life," still just an LP track from Talking Book when Minnelli covered it, although it soon went on to top the singles charts in Wonder's original recording.) This was the same tack that Columbia was taking, for example, with Andy Williams in the same period; it seemed as though the singer picked the material by listening to the radio on the car ride to the studio. Minnelli did her best with the songs, appealingly reversing the sex of the narrators of Lobo's "I'd Love You to Want Me" and Taylor's "Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight," and one could easily envision the production number that might accompany her rendition of "Dancing in the Moonlight." But the songs were almost invariably better performed by the songwriters themselves in the singer/songwriter environment of the early '70s. The Singer became the highest charting studio LP of Minnelli's career, reaching the Top 40. But it missed a chance to establish her recording career on the same firm ground as her acting and live performing.  by William Ruhlmann   
Tracklist
1 I Believe In Music 3:37
Written-By – Mac Davis
2 Use Me 3:39
Written-By – Bill Withers
3 I'd Love You To Want Me 3:36
Written-By – Lobo 
4 Oh, Babe, What Would You Say? 3:31
Written-By – E.S. Smith
5 You're So Vain 3:30
Written-By – Carly Simon
6 Where Is The Love 2:49
Written-By – Ralph MacDonald, William Salter
7 The Singer 2:31
Written-By – W. Marks
8 Don't Let Me Be Lonely Tonight 3:51
Written-By – James Taylor 
9 Dancing In The Moonlight 3:19
Written-By – Sherman Kelly
10 You Are The Sunshine Of My Life 2:36
Written-By – Stevie Wonder
11 Baby Don't Get Hooked On Me 2:52
Written-By – Mac Davis
Credits
Arranged By – Al Capps
Arranged By [Vocals] – Marvin Hamlisch