Wink (CD)

Ken Nordine is probably best known as the impossibly deep, instantly recognizable voice behind numerous TV commercials. His real artistry, though, lies in the "word jazz" field that he created in the '50s. Over jazz backing, he combines ironic, often surreal storytelling with beat-inspired poetry. He released numerous recordings of these works, though only a few made it to CD. Still, his legend looms large enough to provide inspiration to the likes of Tom Waits, Laurie Anderson, and others.

• Category:  Music  »  Spoken Word  »  General/Spoken Word
• Format: CD   Learn more about the CD format using Tower WIKI.
• Release Date: June 24, 2003
• Label: Asphodel
• UPC: 753027201522
• WAPI (Tower ID): 105825130
• Average Customer Review: There are no customer reviews yet. Be the first to write a review!
• Tower.com Sales Rank: #53671 in Music (See Top 100 Music Bestsellers)
• #42 in Spoken Word (See Top 100 Spoken Word Bestsellers)
• #41 in General/Spoken Word (See Top 100 General/Spoken Word Bestsellers)

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WINK is the only one of Ken Nordine's albums on which he's speaking someone else's words. Instead of his own surreal brand of "word jazz," WINK is a reading of the 34 brief poems from Robert Shure's chapbook TWINK, originally published by Lawrence Ferlinghetti's City Lights Press in 1958. (Upon its original 1967 release, this record was also called TWINK, but when the album was reissued by Asphodel on CD in 2003, the title was amended.) Shure's poems were written as interior dialogues, and that's how Nordine performs them, with his voice split between the two stereo channels--normal on the left, echoing and reverb-soaked on the right. Under these surreal, often hilarious tracks, an experimental jazz quartet plays percussion-heavy improvisations that, like the poems themselves, are marvels of beat-generation economy. Although purists might scoff because Nordine didn't write the pieces himself, WINK is both essential for fans and an excellent starting point for curious newcomers.

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