Mary C. Brown and the Hollywood Sign was the fourth solo LP by Dory Previn

Dory Previn

Dory Previn, née Dorothy Veronica Langan , is an American lyricist, singer-songwriter and poet.During the late 1950s and 1960s she was a lyricist for motion picture songs, and with her first husband André Previn received several Academy Award nominations...

, released in November 1972. This was a thematic album about Hollywood misfits. The songs were intended for a musical revue that ran briefly in Los Angeles. It was planned to stage it on Broadway, but the previews were poor and the show was cancelled before it opened.

Reception

Robert Christgau

Robert Christgau

Robert Christgau is an American essayist, music journalist, and self-proclaimed "Dean of American Rock Critics".One of the earliest professional rock critics, Christgau is known for his terse capsule reviews, published since 1969 in his Consumer Guide columns...

, writing in Creem

Creem

Creem , "America's Only Rock 'n' Roll Magazine," was a monthly rock 'n' roll publication first published in March 1969 by Barry Kramer and founding editor Tony Reay. It suspended production in 1989 but received a short-lived renaissance in the early 1990s as a glossy tabloid...

, panned the album, saying "Previn doesn't just belabor a cliche, she flails it with barbed wire, and she never writes about a concrete situation when with extra words she can falsify it with abstraction."

Track listing

1. Mary C. Brown and The Hollywood Sign (4'41)
2. The Holy Man On Malibu Bus Number Three (4'45)
3. The Midget's Lament (4'07)
4. When a Man Wants a Woman (2'25)
5. Cully Surroga He's Almost Blind (5'12)
6. Left Hand Lost (4'56)
7. The Perfect Man (3'11)
8. Starlet Starlet On The Screen Who Will Follow Norma Jean? (2'36)
9. Don't Put Him Down (3'55)
10. King Kong (3'54)
11. Medley (8'36)
    1. Morning Star/Evening Star
    2. Jesus Was A Androgyne
    3. Anima/Animus

Personnel

• Laurindo Almeida - guitar
• David Cohen - guitar
• Bryan Garofalo - bass
• John Guerin
  John Guerin
  John Payne Guerin worked as a drummer, percussionist, and recording artist worldwide.Guerin was born in Hawaii and raised in San Diego. As a young drummer he began performing with Buddy DeFranco in 1960...
  
   - drums
• Peter Jameson - guitar
• Tom Keene - keyboards
• Michael Lang - keyboards
• Joe Osborn
  Joe Osborn
  Joe Osborn is an American bass guitar virtuoso, notable for his work as a session musician in Los Angeles and Nashville during the period from the 1960s through the 1980s. Osborn's work is widely admired by fellow musicians.Osborn began his career working in local clubs, then played on a hit...
  
   - bass
• Earl Palmer
  Earl Palmer
  Earl Cyril Palmer was an American rock & roll and rhythm and blues drummer, and member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame....
  
  - drums
• Reinie Press - bass
• Dory Previn - vocals, guitar
• Peggy Sandvig - keyboards
• Ron Tutt - drums