He’s Funny That Way
LP Arcadia 5001
A compilation of rarities recorded in New York and Los Angeles in the early thirties. We get a couple of tracks with vocal groups, The Rhythm Boys and The Ink Spots, a song from a soundtrack with Ruth Etting and James Stewart’s only (to my knowledge) recorded crooner performance. On My Gal Sal we hear a strange mix of Chick Bullocks vocal and Roy Palmer’s trombone.
But my choice fell on a second Ruth Etting performance with only piano accompaniment, and performed live (also from a soundtrack). It’s a song that can be modelled to fit both male and female singers. Here it should have been better entitled I’m Funny That Way and it sounds very much true coming from Etting who had a tragic relation with a mobster.