All I Really Want to Do is the debut solo studio album by American singer and actress Cher, released on August 16, 1965, by Imperial Records. Issued while she was still recording as part of the duo Sonny & Cher, the album marked her first full-length project under her own name and represented a parallel launch to her work with Sonny Bono on Atco Records.
Produced by Bono with arrangements by Harold Battiste, and recorded at Gold Star Studios in Hollywood, the album is largely composed of cover versions, drawing from contemporary folk and rock material. Its repertoire includes songs by Bob Dylan, Ray Davies, and other established writers, alongside a small number of compositions associated with Bono.
Upon release, All I Really Want to Do was met with generally positive critical reception and achieved notable commercial success. Retrospective reviews have highlighted its production and Cher's vocal presence, while commercially it reached the top 20 in the United States and the top 10 in the United Kingdom.
Background and production
At the same time that the duo Sonny & Cher were debuting on Atco Records, Sonny Bono arranged a solo deal for Cher on the Imperial label. After the success of Sonny & Cher's "I Got You Babe" single, Bono decided to promote his wife as a solo act, producing her first full-length album himself. The album was Cher's first solo project since the release of her two unsuccessful 1964 singles, "Ringo, I Love You" and "Dream Baby", released under the pseudonyms Bonnie Jo Mason and Cherilyn respectively. All I Really Want to Do, like the debut album by Sonny & Cher, Look at Us, contains many covers. The album includes recordings of contemporary, uptempo rock songs, but it also has a somewhat folky slant to it, in order to differentiate it from the musical style of Sonny & Cher's records. Later, in 1995, EMI released a collection titled The Originals, which included All I Really Want to Do, The Sonny Side of Chér, and Cher's third solo album, Chér.
| rev2 = Record Mirror
| rev2Score = Record Mirror wrote that Cher's image is "fantastic" and her voice "isn't as good" without Sonny, adding that "this LP will obviously sell well, but on the strength of her image rather than the quality". Record World included the album among its "Albums of the Week", describing Cher as "no gal is hotter these days".
In a retrospective review, Tim Sendra of the AllMusic noted that the album features Sonny Bono "using his Spector-derived production skills to create rich, chiming backgrounds for Cher to sing over", and described the record as "one of the stronger folk-pop records of the era". Sendra went on to note that "Cher isn't the most subtle singer, but she sounds young and full of life on these tracks, like she really believes in what she is singing (a feeling you don't always get on her more lightweight material)."
| 16
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! scope="row"| US Cash Box Top 100 Albums
| 13
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! scope="row" | US Record World Top 100 LP's
| 7
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Notes
References
sv:All I Really Want to Do