TONY PENULTIMATE: Soppy and the Sentimentals

Tony Penultimate

Soppy and the Sentimentals

© 2004 Tony Penultimate (634479050015)

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A 40 minute romp through a variety of song styles by 6'8" Ukulele playing English eccentric Tony Penultimate (Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain). Some laughs too.

tracks

1 TWYL (Bibbely Babbely)
2 I Made You Love Me
3 Julio
4 Money or the Sun
5 Soppy and the Sentimentals
6 Love took us for a Ride
7 Rock'n'Roll Soldier
8 The Stage
9 Suffer no More
10 Lighthouse
11 The Love that built that Day

notes

Do you like to sit down and really listen to music? - then Tony Penultimate's music may be for you. If on the other hand, music is more of a lifestyle accessory, to be switched on and off like a tap, chances are you won't like it much.

'Soppy and the Sentimentals' is a trawl through many genres including rock, jazz, hip hop, easy listening with each song seemingly different to the proceeding one, yet providing a coherent whole. It's not a great record to put on in the background at dinner parties!

Fine musicians back Tony on this album, amongst others, drummer Toby Baron plays for Ray Davies, while bassist
(and CD Baby artist) Andy Hamill has played with Nitin Sawhney, Ursula Rucker and Kylie Minogue. Rebecca Hollweg (Andy's wife and another CD Baby artist!) sings beautifully. The title track is downloadable free from Tony's website.

Tony Penultimate is a member of the bizarre Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain which enjoys cult success both in the United Kingdom and in Japan. This 6' 8" British eccentric has already released an album: 1999's 'Mainly Manly Music' which was admired by songwriters as diverse as Sir Tim Rice to Robin Gibb and is soon to be reissued due to continued interest.


Tony has performed with British TV comic, Vic Reeves (a clip of them dancing on the Shakin' Stevens video - 'What do you want to make those eyes at me for' - still appears regularly on British TV); sung with Jools Holland's Big Band as well as the 60's ukulele star Tiny Tim. Tony also made an ill-advised appearance (with his pink ukulele) on the Des O'Connor ITV show 'Pot of Gold', causing the TV critic Garry Bushell to label him "a long streak of paralysed pistachio".

His songs have appeared in shows by the cabaret singer, Kate Dimbleby (Music To Watch Boys By) and more recently on the album, 'Bee for Bass' by the session bassist Andy Hamill, which also featured Mark Murphy, Ursula Rucker and Carleen Anderson.

The song, 'The Stage' on Tony's album also features on the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain's album 'The Secret of Life'

I hope you enjoy the clips.

reviews

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  • Would do well in the soundtrack of a Mike Leigh film. Bittersweet.
    author: Beepers

    Well, I promised a review of Soppy & The Sentimentals. I've been sitting here listening to it while at the same time reading Burroughs Naked Lunch. It's a surreal experience to say the least. ANYWAY, SOPPY &THE SENTIMENTALS IS GREAT. BUY IT. NOW! "....sits naked on a barstool covered in pink silk. He licks warm honey from a crystal goblet with a long black tongue..." TONY HAS A VOICE LIKE VELVET! "...In Cuernavaca or was it Taxco? Jane meets a pimp trombone player and disappears in a cloud of tea smoke..." THE UKE LIVES ON.. BUY ONE TODAY!

  • Boy I was thrown for a loop with Tony Penultimate!
    author: Tyranosaur

    Boy I was thrown for a loop with Tony Penultimate which is actually the pen name for Peter Brooke Turner who plays in the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. Apparently the Ukulele Orchestra is of some reknown across the sea though I’ve never heard of them. A whole fleet of ukuleles is something I have to hear. But this isn’t straight up ukulele music (though Tony did write most of the songs on one). This is some campy Elvisey lounge music that hiccups through various genres in a matter of two and a half minutes. The song available on his website is “I Made You Love Me”. In fact I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry or cringe with this music which takes the macaroni and cheesey feel to a new level. The coolest thing is that he’s singing the song with a completely straight face. Somehow that made it just too good to be bad, if you know what I mean. As a honest to goodness 50-60s crooner stuck in the 00’s, Tony Penultimate makes the most of his musical lot in life and really brings life to the party with his album Soppy & the Sentimentals. You could put this on at your latest shindig, and great hilarity will undoubtedly follow…

  • Theatrical, comic and downright weird!
    author: Discovery Records

    Quirky has become an over-used adjective in the music business, but it's one of many appropriate descriptions for singer/composer Tony Penultimate. Theatrical, comic and downright weird would be others ! His many styles combine comparisons with : Jake Thackray, Frank Zappa, Tom Lehrer, the Crash Test Dummies, The Temperence Seven and Ivor Cutler, with the occasional touch of Peter Sellers and The Beach Boys ! Tony is best-known for his towering performances (he's 6'8" !) as a member of the internationally successful Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain who have a well reviewed new album out , toured Japan earlier this year and had a sold-out run at The Barbican, London recently.

  • The unique musical cocktail that is Tony Penultimate!
    author: EarCandymag.com

    Sometimes, you come across music that is so off-the wall and just plain cheesy that it is endearing! Tony Penultimate’s baritone voice combined with his vaudeville-stylings is simply a hoot! Combine one- part Vegas-style lounge singer, one-part Rocky Horror-type campiness, one-part David Bowie glam rock, and one-part the Kink’s at their vaudeville extreme and you get the unique musical cocktail that is Tony Penultimate! I’m just ossified with giddiness at each and every spin of this disc.

  • A 'lounge' feel thats right out of Andy Kaufman
    author: J-Sin

    Beginning with a lounge feel that’s right out of Andy Kaufman’s handbook of comedy, this album is just so out there it works.

  • Guaranteed to grab your attention.
    author: Dave Emery

    This CD defies any attempt to categorise it - maybe a sort of background music from a sleazy 1930s hotel, sung by a slightly out of tune, crooning singer. But add in some hilarious - and sometimes just bizarre - lyrics and you have a whole that, if nothing else, is at least guaranteed to grab your attention. The opening track, TWYL (Bibbely Babbely), features an insane 'a cappella' (bibbely babbely) harmony backing a song set in God's waiting room - "this was your life" - finishing with the line "God will see you know". Then on through the soft shoe shuffle of I Made You Love Me, featuring all the greats of history, Einstein, Lenin, Mohammed Ali ("what did I do?") and Julio, "that singer from Spain" who stole his girlfriend. Other highlights include the title song featuring Soppy, a singer in a Singapore hotel (Tony's alter ego?) who sells his soul to Satan, posing as a stranger from the penthouse on the non-existent 13th floor, and Rock 'n' Roll Soldier, with its outrageous heavy rock background. So how, in amongst all this mayhem, is it that the song that most resolutely sticks in my mind (and refuses to go away no matter how hard I try) is Lighthouse; "you are a lighthouse, what does a lighthouse do?".

  • Great CD - Get It!
    author: Steve in Seattle

    I'm a uke player and I found out about Tony via the great WWW. This album was highly rated amongst ukester circles so I checked out CDBaby for a peek. I was floored by the title song snippet so I bought the CD from CD Baby. Tony has captured the melodic crooning flavor of times long past in this CD as well as about every other musical style out there (including rap). The title song (my favorite), "Soppy and the Sentimentals" is a "story song" with a surprise ending worthy of the Twilight Zone (kind of). Most of the songs on this CD tell a story which is somewhat uncommon these days - and most have a twist at the end. I've never seen Tony perform but I understand that its hard to forget his 6'8" frame playing his pink ukulele. He plays regularly with the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. Tony's style is comfortable and unique, and when listening to the CD I also hear hints of artists I've long admired, enmeshed within his style. Tony Penultimate's voice carries a strong resemblance to that of Vivian Stanshall of the Bonzo Dog Band. Fans of Bonzo, Viv Stanshall and Neil Innes will like this CD. In certain cuts I also hear a tinge of Frank Zappa - like in the harmonies of "Money or the Sun". This is a CD to put on and LISTEN to - my favorite cuts are the title cut as well as "Julio" and "I Made You Love Me". Thanks Tony, keep 'em coming.

  • But it!
    author: J Miller

    Amagine my suprise when I woke up this morning and found a package laying in my hall. Yes it was Tony Penultimate's new CD! I immidiately shoved it in the closest player I could find, lay back and sparked up a ciggy. (not suggesting you smoke, that would be silly). And yes! This CD is a must. Buy this CD! Buy it now, even for your dog. Just make up an excuse and do it, go on, you've got a spare tenner somewhere...you will not regret it. I'm listening to mine now.

  • Not Bad!
    author: David Kidman

    Tony's the toweringly tall one out of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain (whose CD The Secret Of Life I reviewed here a few months back). Soppy is his second solo release; his first – Mainly Manly Music – is shortly to be reissued I understand, though I've not heard it so I've nothing to compare Soppy with but I can't imagine it being vastly different in style or approach (famous last words!). Meaning what, exactly? Well, Tony's singing positively exudes stylishness and suave charm, in fact so much that you're tempted to assume it's all just a very good pastiche of a classy (and classic) smooth cabaret crooner, yet a pastiche that would seem more akin to parody when you encounter the lyrics – virtually all of them Tony's own, incidentally – that are often so surreal they pass beyond the merely Bonzoesque or even Pythonesque into their own fabulous realm of idiosyncrasy. You really do have to be in the right frame of mind (or, to put it more accurately, more than slightly out of the frame!) to appreciate them, and it would have been good to see them printed since Tony's special brand of delivery (invariably) draws one's concentration away from the words. The instrumental arrangements, too, are often so good that then words don't stand much of a chance; they display more than a modicum of imagination, and rope in anything from Latin lounge to rock guitar pyrotechnics along the way. But, perhaps strangely, there's little prominence given to Tony's trusty uke… No matter, for the other musicians (Jonathan Bankes, Jim Watson, George Hinchliffe, Andy Hamill, Bruce Knapp and Tony Baron, together with vocalist Rebecca Hollweg) do a sterling job in helping Tony realise his peculiar vision. A few isolated moments of arguably dubious over-theatricality aside (like The Stage, which had also previously appeared on the Uke Orchestra's CD), there's nothing particularly soppy or sentimental about this record, in fact – it's near-impossible to describe apart from being referential, so I'd recommend you give it a try, though I suspect you'll either love it or hate it, but the final enigma (nay, paradox) is that in the end I don't actually feel strongly either way.

  • Very witty and some lovely tracks.
    author: fiona spence

    Don't be fooled (or indeed confused) by the title... despite the overriding style of crooning Jazz, peppered by rock, rap and reggae (!), Tony Penultimate's deep and expressive voice is not a vehicle for drippy lovesongs. A lot of the album is an achingly funny commentary on some unhappy aspects of life, such as the brilliantly witty "Julio" about a broken holiday romance. The emotional balance is there though, such as in the sweet and funny "I made you love me". I only disliked two tracks on the album, one of which I think because I am too young to appreciate the irony! Tony's own description of the album (I believe)- ironic lounge - is as apt as any, but really Tony Penultimate shares an accolade attributed to the artist he pays homage to in this album, Jaroslav Jezek: "a great composer who defies categorisation". To sum up... Too wit, to woo.

  • Another Ultimate Album
    author: Kim

    If you have been lucky enough to catch a glimpse of the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain then you will love this offering from one of their tallest players. A unique combination of great lyrics and a stunning voice, mixed with ukes!!! If you love something real and a bit different then this is definitely for you!!!! My personal favourites are: TWYL (Bibbely Babbely), The Stage and the terribly sad story of Julio!!! And the rest of the album is excellent too.

  • Witty, dry, droll and full of the joys of experience.
    author: Gidley

    A fantastic collection of Tony's wittly dry and purple penned observations on love, death and the meaning of life. Highlights for me were 'The Stage' which beautifully captures the sickly sentimentality of so many 'sincere' performers and 'Julio' evoking the best and very worst of the hopes & dreams a Spanish holiday can bring. All in all, witty, dry and tongue cheeked.

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