Jazz is restored with "Love For Sale"
The latest collaboration from Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga, Love for Sale, was released this Friday. This is a follow up to their 2014 number-one album, Cheek to Cheek.
This album is a focus on the works of Cole Porter, such as “I Get a Kick Out of You,” from the musical Anything Goes, and “It’s De-Lovely,” from Red Hot and Blue.
One of the collaborative tracks, “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”, gave Gaga a new experience while recording this track.
“A piece of advice Tony gave me was, if you think you’ve hit the bottom of yourself while singing, go deeper,” Gaga said to Zane Lowe during an Apple Music live premiere. “To give you an example, I have a tattoo, Tony Bennett drew, but I quite literally have him under my skin. It’s thinking about how during his life and after his life, he will be with me always, that helps me sing this music.”
Bennett suffers from Alzheimer’s, he announced his retirement shortly after his last performance with Gaga in June 2021, but this disease did not prohibit the creativity it takes to make an album of this stature.
“When that music comes on, something happens to him. He knows exactly what he’s doing,” Gaga said to Anderson Cooper in an upcoming 60 Minutes interview.
Aside from the collaborations on this album, each artist has solo tracks to shine. “Do I Love You?” a solo track by Gaga, is one of the most powerful songs on the album. The crisp vocals and clarity in her voice makes for easy-listening, and truly embodies the certainty in the message of the song to prove love to someone else. Gaga truly takes this song on a journey, with an ending that is too powerful to put into words.
“Let’s Do It,” Gaga’s other solo on the album, is one of the best performances of her career, it transforms a Cole Porter standard into one that can easily become a standard in Gaga’s performance repertoire.
“I can change it every time I sing it,” Gaga said to Lowe, which adds to the raw element throughout the album. “I sang them thousands of times before getting the recording we wanted.”
Bennett does not shy away from perfection in his solo’s either. “So In Love,” adds to the list of classics Bennett has performed throughout what makes this his 61st album. The timelessness of his voice is prominent on this track and on the whole album.
The album is not one big ballad, however. The opener of this album, “It’s De-Lovely” makes it easy to slip away from life challenges and remember what life jazz music can bring.
The fun nature of this song makes it easy to transport existing jazz lovers to a relaxed place while listening to the two artists go back and forth with each other, and makes future generations have an appreciation for the standard jazz classics.
What a way to end a fantastic career for Bennett, Love for Sale takes jazz standards and gives them a new and personal meaning to the artists, and the fans as well.