Ringo Starr 4: Goodnight Vienna

Since it worked last time, Ringo stayed in L.A. with Richard Perry and put together another album relying on the kindness of his friends. Goodnight Vienna brings together some of the same drinking buddies, plus some new ones. (Pointedly absent are Paul and George, the latter most likely because he had strayed into an affair with Ringo’s wife.)

John is slightly more prominent again, beginning with his voice and piano on the title track, which he wrote specifically for the project. It’s not the best tune, with the stumbly tempo and switch to the accordion between every other verse. Ringo does a decent job with “Occapella”, a relatively obscure Allen Toussaint tune that had been around for a while. “Oo-Wee” is one of two songs written with new buddy Vini Poncia, but it’s not much more than a slower and less frantic “Devil Woman”, and mostly notable for Dr. John on piano. Roger Miller’s “Husbands And Wives” is made even mopier by Ringo’s delivery, but “Snookeroo” is an Elton John/Bernie Taupin track made to order, with James Newton Howard on synth but Robbie Robertson on guitar over the Klaus Voormann and Jim Keltner rhythm section.

“All By Myself” is the other Poncia track with Dr. John on most of it, and that’s Richard Perry contributing the jokey bass voice, but Ringo is solely responsible for the mostly harmless “Call Me”, though he’s nearly pushed aside but the backing vocalists. The hit we remember is “No-No Song”, a near-novelty song about sobriety made all the more hilarious because he really did enjoy all the things the track claimed he eschewed, with Harry Nilsson humming along without any irony. But the first single was his cover of the Platters’ “Only You”, suggested by John and very much a blueprint for his own version of “Stand By Me”. The simple yet still lush “Easy For Me” gives Harry a piece of the proceeds, but the pointless reprise of the title track doesn’t do much more than supply brief farewell disguised as a “stay tuned” message.

Those hit singles helped, but even then it was clear Goodnight Vienna simply doesn’t hold as well together as the last one. It’s harmless, and nice to hear once in a while, but not necessarily twice. (Perhaps because somebody didn’t want to overload the Ringo CD at further expense to this album, some anachronistic bonuses were included on the reissue: the noisy 1972 single “Back Off Boogaloo”; its inscrutable B-side, “Blindman”, meant to accompany the hideous film of the same name; and the extended edit of “Six O’Clock” from the 8-track of the Ringo album, featuring another 90 seconds of McCartney music.)

Ringo Starr Goodnight Vienna (1974)—3
1992 CD reissue: same as 1974, plus 3 extra tracks