‘Ukulele Mike by Michael Conway

I got this album in the mail a few days ago from ‘Ukulele Mike himself. That is a big ‘ukulele on the cover – I wonder if anybody has tried to play anything on it!

Mike plays a lot of his songs in a style than I am not used to – jazz. It almost sounds like it could be Ohta-San, Lyle Ritz, or one of the other great jazz players, but he throws something non-jazz into his songs often enough that you remember that it is indeed ‘Ukulele Mike. Only one of the songs is Hawaiian and many others are 50s style; I only recognize about half of them. I think if someone was more familiar with this style of music, they could appreciate this CD more. I prefer the instrumentals to the few vocal performances that ‘Ukulele Mike includes on this CD.

In my opinion the best song on the album is the Beatles song, “Yesterday”. It has no resemblance at all to Jake’s version and Mike adds in a couple of nice notes that Jake does not – kudos! This song does have a little too much percussion in it for my taste.

Best songs:

• Yesterday
• Crocodile Rock
• Homesick Medley