Dino Spumoni – My Last Bow [Review]

Video records of Spumoni’s farewell performance at p.s. 118 in Greenpoint have been lost, save the above still image captured from a security camera in the school cafeteria

Dino Spumoni, once the undisputed king of New York City pop, takes a wistful look back in his latest and final album My Last Bow. Spumoni’s sensational run was largely defined by his legendary in-show antics at Manhattan’s old Circle Theater, most notably his debut of chart-topping single Smashed.

“Darling, you left my heart/ In pieces on the floor/ So tell me why shouldn’t I/ Break some things of yours?/I’ll smash your lamp/ the antique chair/ … Darling – POW – I’ll smash ‘em all”

Ever since, Spumoni’s lyrics have revolved around a comic zeal for chasing women at the expense of his own, or everyone else’s physical well-being. His next hit, No Touching – said to have been debuted at a demolitions-worker convention – seemed to perfect these themes.

“You’d better not touch my gal,” Spumoni crooned in halted, almost threatening tones. “I’ll pop you in the kisser pal.”

In My Last Bow, Spumoni makes it painfully clear that his partying days are over, and the same goes for his time as an inspired songwriter. (Some would argue it became clear when he released YO Dino Raps in the mid-90′s) In the title track Spumoni wails, pathetically, “Life was a gas/ but that gas has passed,” over a somber piano melody that falls down sonic stairs, much like Spumoni’s painful attempt at introspection, “I’ve gone from top of the pops/ to the back of the class.”

By the end of his opening tune at P.S. 118 the students seemed morose and inconsolable. One large-nosed child with a southern twang sobbed to his football-headed friend, “This really bites, Arnold!”

My sentiments exactly.