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Post by Kapitan on Aug 14, 2021 17:13:43 GMT
I am tentatively putting 4. Think of it as about 4.49, not enough to round up. As I said before, that's because there are really only a few songs I even think are OK, and "You" is the only one I can flat-out say I like. It's hard to rate an album even as a 5 when you only like one song (and then are ambivalent about a few, and dislike several).
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Post by kds on Aug 15, 2021 0:24:53 GMT
Crazy isn't it. It's hard to believe that this is really my first deep Beatles solo dive, and the first time I've listened in chronological order. For some reason, I always thought the dip in quality wasn't until later. I'm not denying the dip in quality from George at this time, but if all we heard from George in 1975 were Beatle versions of "You" and "This Guitar (Can't Keep From Crying)" I don't think anyone would have really noticed. While I agree, I'm also not a huge fan of Paul's album of the time.
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Post by lonelysummer on Aug 16, 2021 20:38:44 GMT
I have more to say about comments here, but I'm trying to refrain from jumping ahead on the timeline. I will just add that even if the Beatles had stayed together into the 70's, there was still going to be a dip in quality at some point. I think John needed the break or vacation he took after Rock 'N' Roll. I've nothing against an artist stepping away for a few years to recharge their batteries. George was tossing out albums rapidly from LITMW to 33 & 1/3rd, then he slowed down quite a bit. Ringo kept cranking out albums into the early 80's, then he took a very long break. Paul was the only one who kept up the old pace, and that's his nature. He's not happy if he's not creating. So I can imagine the other guys yelling at him "hey, back off, Macca, we've got other things we wanna do! I wanna spend time with Yoko and Sean". "And I wanna watch some Formula One races". "And I wanna get drunk!" "Besides, we're sick of all the silly love songs!" "Silly love songs? Hold on...I think I feel a song coming on!"
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 16, 2021 20:47:45 GMT
I think you're completely right that staying together wouldn't have been an endless fountain of brilliance.
First and foremost, and I mean this, they didn't want to. That's the most important thing. My little whining the other day was purely from a fan's perspective. But in terms of recognizing these as real, live, human beings? It's all moot, because they didn't want to! Fair enough!
But then also, even if we assume they did want to ... OK, we can see easily enough that they'd have been great throughout the first half of the 70s, because it's easy enough to just take the best songs off each guy's album at any given time and you can make a really good album. They wouldn't all have been Revolver or Abbey Road, but they would have been damn good. But as the 70s wore on, John wasn't doing anything, and the others weren't doing as good of work as they had done earlier in the decade. So even cherry-picking doesn't result in greatness. Can you imagine how ugly that scene could have gotten if they resented or tired of one another AND they weren't churning out top-level stuff?
It ended when it did, and that's fine. They went on to do consistently good stuff for half a decade, and that's great. Then things got spottier, and that's just how it goes. It's fine.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 17, 2021 13:17:06 GMT
Today is the final day for voting on George Harrison's Extra Texture. Please be sure to get in your vote if you've listened and have an opinion. And speaking of opinions, chime in with your thoughts.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 11:11:44 GMT
Six voters rated George Harrison's Extra Texture an average of 6.2.
I'll update the initial post with the rating and shortly launch the next album.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 11:14:11 GMT
Wings, At the Speed of Sound (1976)Less than a year after their Venus and Mars and in the midst of a world tour, Wings released another new studio album, At the Speed of Sound. The album was recorded mostly during breaks in the touring schedule in late 1975 and early 1976, with its music incorporated into live shows when the tour resumed in 1976. The first single from the album was released on April Fool’s Day 1976, “Silly Love Songs,” about a week after the album was released. The song was a response to the criticism that Paul McCartney’s music was insubstantial, unimportant, just a bunch of silly love songs. McCartney told Billboard in 2001 of the song: The disco track (backed with Linda McCartney’s “Cook of the House”) went gold and reached #1 in the US and Canada, and hit #2 in the UK. The album was also a seemingly intentional attempt at presenting a democratized image of the band, with five of the album’s 11 tracks featuring someone other than Paul on lead vocals: Denny Laine sang “The Note You Never Wrote” and “Time to Hide”; Linda sang “Cook of the House”; Jimmy McCulloch sang “Wino Junko”; and Joe English sang “Must Do Something About It.” Two of those songs (“Wino Junko” and “Time to Hide”) were also written by their lead vocalists. Whatever criticism he received for writing silly love songs, At the Speed of Sound was yet another hit for McCartney and Wings. It went platinum and topped the US charts—his fourth consecutive album to hit #1 in the US—went gold and hit #2 in the UK charts, and did well worldwide. Please listen to, rate, and discuss Wings’ At the Speed of Sound. Note: Only the first 11 songs are part of the album proper, with other tracks added for reissues’ bonus goodies.
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Post by jk on Aug 18, 2021 12:01:26 GMT
Wings, At the Speed of Sound (1976)The album was also a seemingly intentional attempt at presenting a democratized image of the band, with five of the album’s 11 tracks featuring someone other than Paul on lead vocals: Denny Laine sang “The Note You Never Wrote” and “Time to Hide”; Linda sang “Cook of the House”; Jimmy McCulloch sang “Wino Junko”; and Joe English sang “Must Do Something About It.” Two of those songs (“Wino Junko” and “Time to Hide”) were also written by their lead vocalists. Whatever criticism he received for writing silly love songs, At the Speed of Sound was yet another hit for McCartney and Wings. It went platinum and topped the US charts—his fourth consecutive album to hit #1 in the US—went gold and hit #2 in the UK charts, and did well worldwide. Now this looks interesting, not least because of the many singers/composers involved. I've linked it for early morning/late night listening.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 14:37:00 GMT
It is a mixed review. The lede reads:
And the review closes with:
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 14:54:23 GMT
Here is a group interview from March 1976. (It takes a few minutes to get going, which might be rough going if you don't know Danish and/or don't enjoy looking at that fabulous Danish fellow.)
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Post by kds on Aug 18, 2021 16:24:39 GMT
I'm thinking about what rating to assign this. I know I like it better than Venus and Mars.
The one thing I'll say right now. Did Paul figure "Fuck, if John's gonna let Yoko sing, I'm letting Linda sing?" Cook of the House isn't exactly a good song to begin with IMO, but having Linda sing it makes it amount to really nothing more than a novelty song (and that's being kind).
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 19:50:34 GMT
I'm thinking about what rating to assign this. I know I like it better than Venus and Mars. Interesting, I feel the opposite regarding that second sentence. Not to say I think it's FAR worse than Venus and Mars, but I do prefer Venus and Mars to this. I am debating my rating, though. There is something about that "pretty good" territory that makes rating albums so hard, I think partly because so many albums end up in that range. You've got indisputably great, you've got really damn good, and then there's just a huge number of OK-to-good albums that feel like they deserve a 10-point range of their own ... but you're kind of limited to maybe roughly 6-7 for that kind of album, particularly because we aren't able to give decimal points.
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Post by kds on Aug 18, 2021 19:56:21 GMT
I'm thinking about what rating to assign this. I know I like it better than Venus and Mars. Interesting, I feel the opposite regarding that second sentence. Not to say I think it's FAR worse than Venus and Mars, but I do prefer Venus and Mars to this. I am debating my rating, though. There is something about that "pretty good" territory that makes rating albums so hard, I think partly because so many albums end up in that range. You've got indisputably great, you've got really damn good, and then there's just a huge number of OK-to-good albums that feel like they deserve a 10-point range of their own ... but you're kind of limited to maybe roughly 6-7 for that kind of album, particularly because we aren't able to give decimal points. Yeah, I don't think there's a huge divide for me between the two, but I found myself enjoying ATSOS more. Although, there might not be a song on ATSOS that I like more than Rockshow. And, there's not a song on V&M that I like less than Cook of the House.
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Post by lonelysummer on Aug 18, 2021 19:58:14 GMT
Actually, Linda had been singing since the first Wings tours in 1972 - she sang Seaside Woman. It was going to be part of Red Rose Speedway, before it got pared down from a double album to a single. It was surprising to me to go back and hunt down live recordings from Wings 72/73 shows. Linda sang, Henry McCullough sang, Denny Laine sang several songs - which leads me to believe the record company was pressuring them to make it "Paul McCartney & Wings" instead of a just a band where Macca was the dominant member. Linda's not a great lead singer, but her harmonies with Paul and Denny were a big part of the Wings sound. The first thing that jumps out at me about Speed of Sound is the drum sound. Best sounding drums I've heard on a 70's record. In fact, the whole record has a very clean, very defined sound. Venus and Mars had a bit of reverb washing over the entire album - maybe that was an attempt at making it sound like a live album? SOS is like the band is in the room with you. The album was a huge seller, yet these days, it gets a lot of bad reviews. The most common complaint is that there's not enough Paul on it. In that respect, I guess it is their Mardi-Gras (CCR's democratic finale). The difference there, is that Cook and Clifford had never sung lead on a record before, never had to write a 3rd of an album before. Jimmy and Denny had already written and sung songs on Wings albums before, so it's not unusual that they would be featured here. The big surprise was drummer Joe English - who turns out to have a very nice voice. And having heard the Paul sung demo of Must Do Something About It, I think they made the right decision to have Joe sing it here.
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Post by Kapitan on Aug 18, 2021 20:11:56 GMT
Interesting, a few of those statements lead me to respond. (Not really disagree, more just respond.) which leads me to believe the record company was pressuring them to make it "Paul McCartney & Wings" instead of a just a band where Macca was the dominant member. It's funny how that went. My understanding of Red Rose Speedway was that Paul's intention (when it was a double album) was to present it as a more democratic band, and that it was indeed the record company wanting it to be more about Paul. There, I think it's not really a surprise or contradiction. I think it got quite a few mixed reviews back then, too, for that matter (like the Rolling Stone one I linked). Seems to me being a huge seller has nothing to do with reviews, plenty of great bands were critically despised.
Personally I don't hear Wings as a great band, but a good band with some great stuff. (Probably a silly distinction to make, but oh well.) But critics seem to have had it out for them from the beginning. It's funny, actually: Paul's too lightweight! George is too (religiously) serious! John is too (politically) serious! You really can't win...
From fans, do you mean, or critics?
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