At His Best

Assembled shortly after Peter Allen's death in 1992, this compilation draws from his five albums released on A&M Records between 1974 and 1980: Continental American (1974), Taught by Experts (1975), the live record It Is Time for Peter Allen (1977), I Could Have Been a Sailor (1979), and Bi-Coastal (1980). With a CD-worthy length of 72 minutes, it supersedes the much shorter A&M LP compilation The Best of Peter Allen (1982). Allen released his first U.S. album, Chris & Peter Allen, on Mercury in 1968, when he was part of a duo. As a solo act, he put out two albums on Metromedia, Peter Allen (1971) and Tenterfield Saddler (1972), before signing to A&M. After leaving A&M, he released albums on Arista and RCA. So, the A&M years constitute a generous complement of his work, more than that of any other label, though still less than half of his recordings. But they were crucial years for him. The Peter Allen of the Metromedia albums was a confessional singer/songwriter, very much in the James Taylor/Carole King mode, his work typified by the autobiographical family saga "Tenterfield Saddler" (the title a reference to his grandfather), which is included here in a live version. By the time he signed to A&M, Allen, an Australia native, had relocated to New York and developed a following in the city's cabarets. He could still write sensitive ballads, such as "I Honestly Love You," recorded for a gold-selling number one hit by Olivia Newton-John and included on Continental American, but he was also capable of camping his way through "Just a Gigolo" and penning the classic pop-style pastiche "Everything Old Is New Again." His subsequent A&M albums traced his development into a flamboyant performer with a taste for disco and light funk whose signature song was the Latinate "I Go to Rio," though, working with lyricist Carole Bayer Sager, he continued to turn out powerful ballads, with I Could Have Been a Sailor bequeathing the hits "Don't Cry Out Loud" to Melissa Manchester and "I'd Rather Leave While I'm in Love" to Rita Coolidge. At His Best contains Allen's versions of all of these songs, along with his tribute to his former mother-in-law, Judy Garland, "Quiet Please, There's a Lady on Stage." It would take cooperation among several labels to better this compilation, and such an effort still wouldn't produce an album that featured more of Allen's best-known songs. ~ William Ruhlmann