Neil Diamond - Velvet Gloves and Spit

According to the liner notes for IN MY LIFETIME, "Shilo" was the song that led Neil Diamond to split with Bang Records, his first record label. As Diamond tells it, the song's personal tone convinced both the label and the artist that it was time to move on. Diamond's desire to stretch beyond the confines of his early hits "Cherry, Cherry" and "I'm A Believer" are fully evident on VELVET GLOVES AND SPIT, his first album for MCA.

VELVET GLOVES AND SPIT includes both "Shilo" and "Brooklyn Roads," songs that did not tear up the charts at the time but have since become standards. It also includes several "should-have-been" hits, among them the raucous "Two-Bit Manchild," the bouncy "Honey-Drippin' Times," and the hook-laden "Sunday Sun." The album also includes several earnest but laughable efforts, notably the anti-drug song "The Pot Smoker's Song," which intersperses a singsong chorus with the horrifying spoken confessions of drug addicts, and "Knackelflerg," a failed effort at writing a folk-pop equivalent of "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious." Even the failures, however, show that, in his prime, Diamond was virtually incapable of writing an unmemorable melody. Just try getting "Knackelflerg" out of your head once you've heard it!