Moments that bring down good songs

[lbfan]

CD Single referenced above.

[Kubrick2788]

There was someone that mentioned the spoken word part on Illume...and I have to agree that it totally torpedoes that song. I'm not a huge fan of it, but that seems like a deliberate attempt to junk the song. How could anyone have thought that was a good idea?!?

[MikeVielhaber]

Originally Posted by Kubrick2788

There was someone that mentioned the spoken word part on Illume...and I have to agree that it totally torpedoes that song. I'm not a huge fan of it, but that seems like a deliberate attempt to junk the song. How could anyone have thought that was a good idea?!?

So now we're making accusations of malicious intent? Lindsey always does weird stuff in his production especially with voices. I don't see this as any different.

[sodascouts]

No, there's no malicious intent. Sometime in the 80s Lindsey decided that it was mega-cool to distort voices. He's been doing it fairly regularly in songs ever since. And hey, it allows him to do a pretty effective simulation of female orgasmic cries in "Big Love"!

Still, you'd think he would realize that while that kind of gimmick might work for quirky songs, it has no place in an emotionally raw song about 9/11.

I think that kind of thing is why Stevie might be hesitant to have him produce her work for the current album.

However, I want Lindsey to produce. I still think he's brilliant; it's just he gets carried away with his gadgetry sometimes. If she could work with him and let him know when she's not comfortable with something beforehand, rather than waiting until it's too late and then complaining about it after the fact, we wouldn't need another producer. Teamwork, people!

[sanders8323]

"Heroes Are Hard to Find": I think the horns bring down an otherwise decent tune, making the song sound a bit too campy. A guitar would have worked better in their place.

"Straight Back": At one point it seems like John isn't sure what bass parts to play, and the result sounds like the bass isn't in sync with the melody. The verses are fine, but it's at the beginning of one of the choruses that this happens.

Tusk tour versions of "Rhiannon": Of most of the boots I've heard of this tour, it seems like Stevie just rambles and rambles during the climax of the song. Alot of times she sounds so monotone and her vocal is not bringing the needed intensity the song warrants. It's really a shadow of how she performed the song during the White album tour and most of the Rumours tour. Also the way she begins the song on this tour---"She rings like a bell through the night" instead of "Rhiannon rings like a bell through the night," makes it sound like she's starting on the second verse instead of the first, and it kind of throws off the listener.

[BLY]

Originally Posted by sodascouts

No, there's no malicious intent. Sometime in the 80s Lindsey decided that it was mega-cool to distort voices. He's been doing it fairly regularly in songs ever since. And hey, it allows him to do a pretty effective simulation of female orgasmic cries in "Big Love"!

Still, you'd think he would realize that while that kind of gimmick might work for quirky songs, it has no place in an emotionally raw song about 9/11.

I think that kind of thing is why Stevie might be hesitant to have him produce her work for the current album.

However, I want Lindsey to produce. I still think he's brilliant; it's just he gets carried away with his gadgetry sometimes. If she could work with him and let him know when she's not comfortable with something beforehand, rather than waiting until it's too late and then complaining about it after the fact, we wouldn't need another producer. Teamwork, people!

I totally agree with you Nancy. Lindsey needed to do some of his "magic" on Mirage and Tango to make it sound like it was a true band effort.

[Wdm6789]

I always like live versions of Rhiannon better than the album version. I like "once in a million years a lady like her rises" better than "all your life." I like the "all your life" at the beginning, but when Stevie starts the chorus I like "once in a million years."

[MikeVielhaber]

Originally Posted by Wdm6789

I always like live versions of Rhiannon better than the album version. I like "once in a million years a lady like her rises" better than "all your life." I like the "all your life" at the beginning, but when Stevie starts the chorus I like "once in a million years."

I don't think that line scans as well. It sounds awkward. That whole bit really through "your life knows know answer". It doesn't fit well with the music and she basically shoehorns it in there.

[GypsySorcerer]

I like the single version of "Over My Head" better than the album version. I also like "Say Goodbye" on the album.

"Bleed to Love Her" is a gorgeous song, but there's too much noodling on the SYW version.

I don't like Stevie's vocals on "Peacekeeper." The song was much better to me as a Lindsey solo song.

[TimeCastASpell]

No one has mentioned the current way- well I guess from The Dance on that Silver Springs ends! Ugggggggh! Just kills me that any of the many Rumours era variations I have in my collection didn't make it out as a single way back when. I LOVE LOVE LOVE as in literally I consider it the greatest musical moment of all time- ALL TIME- (I'm absolutely obsessed) with how intense the end of Silver Springs is. I blast and scream along to "I'll Fol-Low You Down till the soooo-ound of my voice will HAAAUNT you." Just ahhh oh my gosh I can never get enough. It just does things to my mind and soul and body. So much intensity. Like I said, I basically scream along to it. I will fast forward to it and rewind again and again. THAT is how the song should end! I get that she's older and her voice had changed and heck even a young person can't likely sustain that vocal intensity (its too close to a scream. It's got to be potentially damaging on the vocal chords, no?) but uggggh I am so insanely disappointed by the whole tacked on floaty suddenly it's all okay forget that intensity and all "You could be my sil-ver spring. My blue green coooooooloes flaaaaashing." End. Just no. Kills it. When the original end legitimately is what takes some incredible lyrics and vocals into flat out mindblowing territory. It flat out kills the whole song to end that way. I'm not fond of songs that do that sort of end anyway. It sounds tacked on, forced. Whatever. And it's as it emotionally, never mind, those lyrics don't mean anything, forget it. Pretty song. Forget the intensity.

That's probably an overly passionate explanation- and what do you expect from TimeCastASpell, eh?

I agree with many others listed. Hate kid voices on any song and I kind of like Say You Will as just a lighthearted sort of fun song. And while I'm a pretty big fan of SYW in general I guess I definitely do see how much the band has been lacking those flat out incredible moments like the SS ending or the incredible Bass line and the build up in The Chain. I think I personally have a thing for intensity- speaking of which the line from Seven Wonders that goes "It's hard to find someone with that kii-ind of in-ten-sit-y is another of those moments for me. Maybe one of the very last truly great moments I can think of from the band. I know I'm such a big Fleetwood Mac fan because of those moments. Because of how it feels when I hear them. So killing any such moments will get me every time for sure. I do miss Stevie's high notes but I'm not even sure it's the pitch itself or just the force she would put behind her voice, you know? Or the delicious way her voice then drops. A lot of the older songs really played with Stevie's range. I love that. It's part of what's missing in newer songs to a degree.

[TimeCastASpell]

Originally Posted by GypsySorcerer

"Bleed to Love Her" is a gorgeous song, but there's too much noodling on the SYW version.

Definitely agree! I absolutely love BTLH. Ranks near the top of my favorite love sing list. But just the other day I was playing SYW for the first time in awhile and just felt let down by BTLH. And when you have fans 5 years to sing along with and love the version from The Dance and then go and play around with it, by nature many of us are going to think "Eh, this version is off. I don't like it.", you know? I really wish they hadn't bothered putting it on SYW.

[MikeVielhaber]

Originally Posted by TimeCastASpell

Definitely agree! I absolutely love BTLH. Ranks near the top of my favorite love sing list. But just the other day I was playing SYW for the first time in awhile and just felt let down by BTLH. And when you have fans 5 years to sing along with and love the version from The Dance and then go and play around with it, by nature many of us are going to think "Eh, this version is off. I don't like it.", you know? I really wish they hadn't bothered putting it on SYW.

I bet BTLH, as they had recorded it in the studio at the time prior to The Dance, was not much different than the version on SYW. They probably changed it up for the live version on the Dance.

[Kubrick2788]

@TimeCastASpell,

I like to think that the newer live version of SS (post Dance) is a reflection of Stevie's resigning to the fact that she will never have Lindsey. That slowed, drawn out reading of the lines comes across as longing for something that just won't come. I think it works and goes along with her mellowing on the whole thing after some time. Maybe in '97 there were still bits of actual romance related resentment, but now I'd like to think she's over all that business. She's not petty b/c she's still in love...now it's about money!

[BLY]

[QUOTE=TimeCastASpell;1125283]No one has mentioned the current way- well I guess from The Dance on that Silver Springs ends! Ugggggggh! Just kills me that any of the many Rumours era variations I have in my collection didn't make it out as a single way back when. I LOVE LOVE LOVE as in literally I consider it the greatest musical moment of all time- ALL TIME- (I'm absolutely obsessed) with how intense the end of Silver Springs is. I blast and scream along to "I'll Fol-Low You Down till the soooo-ound of my voice will HAAAUNT you." Just ahhh oh my gosh I can never get enough. It just does things to my mind and soul and body. So much intensity. Like I said, I basically scream along to it. I will fast forward to it and rewind again and again. THAT is how the song should end! I get that she's older and her voice had changed and heck even a young person can't likely sustain that vocal intensity (its too close to a scream. It's got to be potentially damaging on the vocal chords, no?) but uggggh I am so insanely disappointed by the whole tacked on floaty suddenly it's all okay forget that
intensity and all "You could be my sil-ver spring. My blue green coooooooloes flaaaaashing." End. Just no. Kills it. When the original end legitimately is what takes some incredible lyrics and vocals into flat out mindblowing territory. It flat out kills the whole song to end that way. I'm not fond of songs that do that sort of end anyway. It sounds tacked on, forced. Whatever. And it's as it emotionally, never mind, those lyrics don't mean anything, forget it. Pretty song. Forget the intensity.

That's probably an overly passionate explanation- and what do you expect from TimeCastASpell,



As thrilled as I was when the MAC did SS for the Dance I still didn't get that chill I did (and still do) when I hear the studio version. I will never forget the first time I heard that song on a juke box in the Poconos in 1977 on a family vacation. To this day when I hear the studio version I get chills as the song builds and builds and ends with a faded chorus. I don't like the way the live version ends but do LOVE the song is being performed.

[jmn3]

I don't know exactly when she started this with Rhiannon, I want to say 2001? Maybe earlier...I don't recall exactly, but that whole "Wellllll, I don't think you DO!?" is so jerky sounding and it really makes no sense. I don't think you do what? I believe it follows a couple of "Would you even try"'s...so it makes no sense at all.

The kids at the end of SYW, I have to agree, make an already clunker of a song, even worse!

Oh, and I can't forget Stevie's lyric alterations to Don't Stop....just awful. Again, in the context of the song, her lyrics make no sense.