Nancy Sinatra

You Go-Go Girl!
(Varese Sarabande)

She may not have invented pop music. But because her pop's surname just happened to be Sinatra, this minimally talented nepomaniac certainly exploited the genre for all it's worth.

"She" is Nancy Sinatra, she of the much-celebrated "laughing face" and less-lauded lousy pipes. Both are in evident abundance in this for-completists-only compilation whose title sounds like the punch line of a Tarzan skit on Dean Martin's old TV show.

The heavily illustrated liner notes (featuring many, many photos in which the bewigged swinger was experimenting with a look somewhere between Ann-Margret, Joey Heatherton and Honey West) claim that the sloe-eyed apple of Frankie's aqua orbs charted 21 songs between 1966 and 1970. But outside of habitués of The Daisy (or wherever Frank and Mia were hanging out in those days), it's a cinch that most folks can't name more than one or two.

Remember "How Does That Grab You, Darlin'"? (Didn't think so, sweetie.) Or how about "Geronimo" (from The Ghost in the Invisible Bikini), or Nancy's cover of the Chris Montez oldie "Call Me"?

Nope.

With the possible exception of the groundbreaking father-daughter incest classic "Somethin' Stupid" (sadly, not included here) and the theme song from You Only Live Twice, the sup-hose-sporting Sinatra will march to her grave singing "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'," the catchy, ass-kickin' anthem that's been covered by virtually every songstress up to and including Edith Massey of Pink Flamingos fame. But even Nancy fans will find their patience tested here. Because nearly half the sound-alike songs on this CD were penned by "Boots'" Lee Hazlewood, by the end of the disc listeners will be tempted to tell Nancy to put on her celebrated footwear and, well, take a hike.

Temporarily abandoning her aging clodhoppers, the erstwhile Playboy model does dredge up a non-"Boots"-related bonus track, a hilarious duet with Hazlewood in which the pair mangle Mickey and Sylvia's "Love Is Strange." ("Billy Strange?" coos Sinatra, an inside gag that must have had 'em rolling in the aisles at Jilly's.)

The track was part of a never-released album of "funked up" cover songs in which the pair would have teamed up on numbers like "If I Were a Rich Man." You go-go girl, and finish that album!