The cover art of
Herb Alpert's Ninth is hilarious -- a bust of grim old
Beethoven wearing a
Herb Alpert sweatshirt, a parody of the pop icon fad going around at the time and maybe a comment on the rock world's newfound pretensions in the wake of
the Beatles'
Sgt. Pepper. In any case,
Herb Alpert's Ninth does introduce some highbrow pretensions of sorts to
Alpert's Ameriachi sound -- some very subtly applied strands of strings on several numbers and a madcap, multi-sectioned fantasy of tunes from
Bizet's Carmen that is full of in-jokes from the opera and
the TJB's hits.
Alpert is also quite aware of the brave new world around him; he does a spare, lazy, yet entirely novel-sounding cover version of
Sgt. Pepper's "With a Little Help from My Friends" and gives
the Supremes' "The Happening" a bouncy workout. There is also a touching memorial to the late
Ervan Coleman ("Bud") and another underrated contribution from the
Alpert songwriting team,
Sol Lake's swinging "Cowboys and Indians." The TJB still churns out the Latin American rhythms, but sometimes with a shade less exuberance.