Rating: 
Summary: I Know Now Why Sinatra Matters....
Review: Why Sinatra Matters is an uncensored realistic book on whom other, Frank Sinatra. The book tells of his life, his friends, family, and most of all his intoxicating voice as a singer. To his late night partying, to his ridiculously famous music, this book gives a background not only to his singing and song writing, but to his complex life behind the curtain. However, through marriages, divorces, relationships and more, his music remained untouched. Music remained a rescue boat in his fast pasted life. One of his good friends Pete Hamill, the writer, talks about their past enjoyment at certain clubs and talking about various topics as boxing, women, and their favorite writers. The book also tells about Sinatra's early years and how he came to the road to stardom and how he even paved some of it himself.
This book was defiantly something that interested me. Not very many books catch my eye like this book, and that's saying a lot. Most books contain too much blain description, but this book had description to the point where I want to go buy the whole Sinatra collection. I would tell others to read book to gain knowledge of how one of the greats lived, loved, and never took it for granted. Frank Sinatra will live in infinity as well as his music, and the way he lived his life. The youth of today as well as the adults, that live in modern suburbia could learn more than one thing of this legend of a man. If I even live one year of my life the way he did, I would die a happy man......
Rating: 
Summary: Coffee Table Pick-Up
Review: * ½ Hamill's essay reads like a politically corrected apology, rather than a eulogy for an admired acquaintance. Likely Hamill dipped his quill in Oxy-10, as he attempts to remove any blemish from Sinatra's record. Hamill's terse and sketchy Sinatra tribute is a revisionist's interpretation of Sinatra's career. Thanks to the brevity of the book, it most likely will not fatally wound the reader's appreciation of the singer himself. From the outset, Hamill admits that he is primarily a voyeur of Sinatra's career. The writer himself had brief and sporadic contact with Sinatra, and the spareness of the contact shows in the book's lack of intimacy. The antidotes relayed in the book seem to be culled from other books, rather than recounted by Sinatra or his intimates. Hamill paints Sinatra in broad strokes and generalities, while attempting to force him into iconic symbolism that does not quite fit. If anything, Sinatra seems to stands for time when individuals could say what they meant; rather than censure themselves out of fear of misinterpretation. Sinatra remains as a symbol of honest masculinity - a time when a man could act like a man, stumble and fall, and then right himself again without apology or explanation. Sinatra was capable of boozing and carousing which, at the time, was accepted as a brand of hedonism that was both understandable and identifiable. Sinatra was not confined by the current constraints of political-correctness, he could call a woman a "broad" or a "dame," and intend and mean it as a compliment, instead of having it taken as an insult. Sinatra was respected because he made no excuses for his common human frailties; rather, he accepted them face forward with enviable honesty. What is most disappointing is that Hammill paints Sinatra as a victim. Hammill depicts Sinatra as a victim, without complicity, to racism, mob-ties, opportunistic women, greedy managers, professional acquaintances, as well as an unwise selection of political allies. It is hard to believe that Sinatra intended himself to be viewed as pawn of others' manipulations; rather than, the product of his own decisions. As the author himself admits, there are other Sinatra biographies that more richly portray the events of Sinatra's life. With that recognition, this book would have been more interesting as a reflection of Sinatra's influence on the author's life. The book's packaging is nifty and its only value is a sales' item pick-up for coffee table display.
Rating: 
Summary: Got the World on a Swing
Review: A masterpiece. I never met Sinatra but he gave my a lot of action for a lot of years. I listened to him when I was in high school and I'm still with the man. Hammil's book put Sinarta closer. He (Sintra) was in my heart and soul and now he is in my mind. Hammil has brought those Sinatra years in America to life. What a beautiful eulogy!
Rating:
Summary: Oh, if only it were longer.
Review: As an ex oldies rock and roll disc jockey who managed to squeeze two or three Sinatra tunes in every week, I looked forward to reading this book, especially since it was written by one of my favorite chroniclers of the American passing scene. I was not disappointed. In this little book, or elongated essay, Pete Hamill makes a compelling case for the value of Frank Sinatra to the America psyche. He contends that Sinatra matters because he created the American male image of being tough, yet at the same time tender. He also states that Frank matters because of his music, grounded in loneliness, yet still optimistic. I also learned something. My world has often been surrounded by those of Italian heritage, and Hamill has made me understand them better. First, he relates the beginning of the awareness of the Italian Mob/Mafia in our country. He claims the myth began in 1891 when eleven Italian immigrants were accused of killing a corrupt police superintendent in New Orleans. Although all 11 were found innocent, a mob of several thousand people, roused to rabble by incendiary newspaper articles, attacked the jail where the men were waiting release, and killed them all. (This is another glaring incident that was never mentioned in my America-is-never-wrong high school or college history lessons.) Hamill does indeed say the mob/Mafia was a factor in America, but came to fruition, decades after the New Orleans incident, through the stupidity of our country's prohibition. He also explains why Italians call themselves Genoese or Sicilians, not Italians. It's because there really was no united Italy until 1871. Instead of the country, an immigrant thought of his region of birth as his homeland. Hamill spends a good deal of time pointing up the importance of Sinatra's Italian background. He points to pre-war 1940 when Mayor LaGuardia, Yankee Centerfielder Joe Dimaggio, and Frank, each of Italian ancestry, were three of the most beloved individuals in the country. In this work, Hamill discusses Frank's childhood, the immense impression of Bing Crosby, Frank's big band years, his beginnings as a solo vocalist, his career collapse coinciding with his marriage to Ava Gardner and the hatred many returning soldiers felt toward the 4-F crooner, concluding with his artistic rebirth beginning with his Oscar winning role in "From Here to Eternity." Much of Hamill's insight is culled from conversations he had with the singer during the 1970s and `80s, although there are a couple of times he delves deep into Sinatra's head as a youth and I wondered, "How could he ever know that?" But, except for those few lapses, this is a right-on book about one of the world's greatest entertainers. At the end of the book, Hamill proposes a list of must-have Sinatra recordings, must-see Sinatra movies, and a bibliography of books dealing with Sinatra and his era. I have all the recordings, seen all the movies, but Hamill has inspired me to read some of the books. (But not Kitty Kelley's character assassination, thank you very much.)
Rating:
Summary: good insight into sinatra ....
Review: but i had two problems with it: 1) far too short; and 2) it glossed over latter part of his career.
Rating:
Summary: Great book, horrible book-on-tape
Review: Do not buy the book on tape! Get it in hardcover or paperback. This is a fine little book, but it's the first book on tape I have had to turn off because the narrator's voice was too grating (and I've listened to tons of books on tape). Had it been read by the author himself, certainly allowances could be made. Instead, the publisher went out to find a professional reader and chose someone who speaks in an harsh, barking monotone, one part Howard Cosell, one part Rain Man, one part the guy who does the Moviephone listings. When the voice first came on, reading the copyright information and other technical details, I assumed that, well, that's just the preliminaries, surely someone else will narrate the rest of the tape. Nope. Amazing.
I have switched to the print version, which is excellent.
Rating:
Summary: Great book - too short!
Review: Hamill has a true talent for identifying and decsribing the American ethnic experience. He combines this with frank personal insights in a illuminating and entertaining book about a tremendous figure. The only problem was the second half of the book was lost on the way to the publishers and thus never made into print!
Rating:
Summary: Beautiful book, nice essay, nothing new
Review: I agree with the reviewer who wrote that the question posed by the title could have been answered in 10 pages. The music matters, and no one got inside a song like Frank Sinatra. That said, Hamill is a marvelous writer and this is a terrific read for those who are unfamiliar with his story. I devoured every page anyway. The quotes by Sinatra are fascinating, and Hamill's admittedly remote acquaintance with his subject (they met several times in New York) lends this relevance and legitimacy. Hamill also dwells on what is commonly considered the apex of Sinatra's career, his classic albums at Capitol, and even takes a swipe at Gordon Jenkins' string-laden efforts during this period -- so, not a good book if you want an overview of Sinatra's musical legacy. If Sinatra saw enough in Jenkins to have him as an arranger from the 1950s through the '80s, clearly there is something that Hamill is missing that Sinatra cherished. But -- this is Hamill's heartfelt homage to someone whom he considers an artistic hero of sorts, and his rather narrow focus is completely appropriate for this sort of book. I would recommend this book to any Sinatra fan. However, you should also read Will Friedwald's "The Song is You" for an exhaustive story of the music. I also enjoyed Donald Clarke's "All or Nothing At All", which is more of a biography with pertinent commentary. I have dozens of Sinatra albums, and I still discover amazing new aspects to music that I have heard for years. Sinatra definitely matters, and this book was written by another guy who misses him.
Rating: 
Summary: Insightful but poorly written
Review: I am a Sinatra fan (not a fanatic) and found this tiny book worthwhile for its insights into Sinatra's voice and career, and for the quotes from the man himself sprinkled throughout. But the writing is awful. This is the first Pete Hamill book I've read, and it makes me wonder what all the fuss is about. His style is, by turns, repetitive, gassy and tin-eared.
Rating:
Summary: THE MOST LUCID, INTELLIGENT LOOK AT THE LEGEND
Review: I am the eleventh of twelve kids. I am 42, and come out of Brooklyn. I have walked the streets of Hoboken. It reminds me of Bay Ridge, but the Statue of Liberty is facing the other way, and the Twin Towers are so big and close. My father had a bar in Brooklyn: a place that catered to the lonely: longshoreman who didn't want to go home for whatever reasons, older women who were jilted by the latest bum. They drank, a concordat of losers. In silence, they smoked unfiltered cigarettes and listened to that guy on the jukebox. The guy who really felt their pain, decades before it became some rank political joke. The voice was Frank Sinatra's, and he was my hero since I could walk. Pete Hamill, whom I've been reading for over twenty-five years, has the lapidary's eye, the poet's words, in his brilliant analysis of Sinatra the man, and what his essence really meant. Speaking of Sinatra after his death, Hamill writes: "Now Sinatra is gone, taking with him all his anger, cruelty, generosity, and personal style. The music remains. In times to come, that music will continue to matter, whatever happens to our evolving popular culture. The world of my grand-children will not listen to Sinatra in the way four generations of Americans have listened to him. But high art always survives. Long after his death, Charlie Parker still plays his version of the urban blues, Billie Hoilday still whispers her anguish. Mozart still erupts in joy.....In their ultimate triumph over the banality of death, such artists continue to matter. So will Frank Sinatra." This slim volume is the best thing I've read about Sinatra. Hamill hides no blemishes, and still gives us a totality of the man that no other biographer could. Alas, most great singers and writers now repose on the other side of the grass. We no longer have Sinatra in the flesh, yet, through his music, he will outlive everyone. And in the year 2067, a young adult will listen to the unparalleled majesty of his voice for the first time, and then go to the library to read WHY SINATRA MATTERS by Pete Hamill to make some sense of it all. KEVIN FARRELL
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