Robbie Williams
Swing When You're Winning

THE REVIEW

Ideal subtitle: Deal-with-it.

The good old Robbie is more or less the ideal archetype of a male superstar/popstar as I see it: charisma, charm, the right amount of cheekiness, and above all, he has always offered (at least from what I know, up until around 2007/2008) good quality Pop with unmistakably British-European connotations, which is already better than any "counterpart" from across the ocean. Excellent performer, dynamic, eclectic, never overly sentimental, let's say that I'm even willing to forgive him certain collaborations with a certain Australian flake, imagine that, after all, business is business and he's a great guy.

A great guy... uhm... tell me, is there perhaps a musical genre capable of embodying the concept of "cool" in its classiest sense better than swing? Come on, even the name is enough to evoke a distinctive visual imagery; hair gel, champagne, a bon-vivant attitude, superficial just enough, that everyone needs, in the right amount, at least in my opinion. At least I never miss out on it whenever I can.

With these premises, I consider "Swing When You're Winning" from 2001 the pinnacle of Robbie's career, at least from a purely interpretative point of view. A flawless collection of standards performed with a perfect entertainer/cabaret attitude. He's really into it, timeless melodies like "Mack The Knife", "Things", and "Ain't That A Kick In The Head" fit him like a glove, and besides, they are perfect touchstones to evaluate the caliber of a performer: can you imagine some Disney-made parvenu handling such material? Eh eh eh...

Among smoother performances like "They Can't Take That Away From Me" and "One For My Baby", a grandiose and sufficiently Broadway-like introduction such as "I Will Talk And Hollywood Will Listen", and a couple of impeccable singles, "Somethin' Stupid" and "Mr. Bojangles", time flies with absolute class and lightness, reaching its peaks in a couple of exquisite moments of pure cabaret, "Me And My Shadow" and especially the priceless "Well, Did You Evah!", a masterpiece of Porter-like memory.

It would be great if so-called stars were all like Robbie, able as he is to entertain, with an eye for class and style, for traditions like the one celebrated in this album. Robbie is perhaps the last heir, obviously a child of his times, obviously in due proportion, of the lineage of Freddie Mercury, Elton John, perhaps George Michael, or Ron Dennis and Frank Williams, James Hunt and Jenson Button, all people who have in their way contributed to giving an unmistakable (and envied, for good reasons) image to Perfida Albione. May God and the Queen have him in their glory.

Now, as a good rule, I should close with some bolded lines; I would say that in this case

"What a swell party this is!"

Could suffice.