Consumer Guide Album

Barbra Streisand: The Way We Were [Columbia, 1974]
Theoretically, I am encouraged by Barbra's abandonment of Richard Perry and Contemporary Material, and in practice I love the title song, one of those beyootiful ballads that are the gift of AM programming to the reprobate rock and roller. But my big theory has always been that we like contemporary material because it is, well, contemporary, and in practice most of these performances generate a pristine, somewhat chill unreality even as they simulate warmth, maturity, all that stuff. Also, I'm not humming any of them after half a dozen plays. B−