Welcome to the Room...Sara: Discussion
 

Okee, this is one of Stevie's famous "no love" songs...meaning, it gets no love!! I like it! I mean, it's no Rhiannon, Gypsy or Silver Springs, but it ain't WISYA either (THANK GOD!! LOL). I couldn't do a thread on WISYA, because it's MY "no love" song...I can't stand it...it's the ONLY FM/SN song I can't stand...which is a pretty good batting average, huh? LOL Anywho...

WTTRS is a cool song...it's catchy, it's real because she's writing about her life at the moment in time and I love when Lindsey sings "first cut is the deepest one of all", "for Scarlett" and "welcome"!! I think it's a pretty song, I like the melody. If I didn't know about Stevie's drug problems, I would look like this
---> "confused" in regards to the song, but it's good to know her background, it helps to understand the lyrics better.

So, whaddayathink about WTTRS? No haters here please!! LOL Just people who love the song...or like it alot. :)

The lyrics are... intriguing to say the least, especially at the beginning, but they paint a nice picture ("did I come here on my own?" is a very revealing verse), and despite the "80's" package and Stevie's vocals (which I really don't like in the whole album -- but then again, I can only hear her in four songs), I like the song. It's quite catchy, as ironic as it gets.


Song of the moment - Smile At You

I've always liked Welcome to the Room...Sara. I always thought it was quite obvious what the song was about, and I like the fact that she wrote a song about rehab. I don't think that's a very easy thing to do. I also enjoy Lindsey's background vocals, I love the lyrics, especially "when you hang up that phone, well you cease to exist," which is actually the only line I'm not too sure about the meaning. I THINK I know the meaning, but I could be wrong. It's actually strange, because ever since I found out how many people don't like this song, for a while when I played I would kind of feel embarassed and get the feeling like, "Everyone says this song sucks, I shouldn't like it this much." But I really don't care anymore...I think it's good, and I would still like to hear it live.

I actually sort of like this song, too. It's certainly not a favorite, but I like the meaning, and Stevie's choked-up fractured voice from that era makes her seems so vulnerable.

Sorcerer, as far as the line about hanging up the phone and ceasing to exist, I was discussing this with some other fans over on the BN board, and we kind of traced it to a quote from Stevie regarding Joe Walsh. Stevie said that Joe had actually said something of that same effect to her, only I think it was, "If you walk out that door you cease to exist."

I guess she is referencing that, which would be just like her!

-Sharon

I agree completely :nod:! I love this song, though I'm not crazy about WISYA. I love what Lindsey and Chris add to it. Their harmonies and that little instrumental melody (you just know it's Lindseys!) are so awesome (I just love when Lindsey sings "welcoooooome")...little touches like those, I've always thought, would have really enhanced many Stevie solo songs where it seemed like the production/instrumentation was totally disconnected from Stevie's melody and lyrics. This song, I think, has a great connection between all its elements. It's so nice to hear Stevie in the 80s with that kind of flow to a song. In that sense, to me, it's very unique. Certainly not my fave song on Tango. I think right now my fave Tango song is Big Love. My least favorite, by far, is Mystified :rolleyes:. But overall, I think the album is way underrated.
-Sonia

it's not that i "like" or "love" this song. i adore it.
in my opinion it's one of FM's best songs ever, maybe even their best ever.
it took me long to dig this one, but eventually it came to be my favorite song from TITN, and that was the song which made me go to the record store and buy The Wild Heart and Rumours.
each time it amazes me how many ppl here antagonize this one and i have no idea why. to me this song is pure perfection in every way.
WELCOME TO THE ROOM...SARA DEFINES THE TERM "MASTERPIECE"!!!

A little history...
 

...everyone who already knows this, just skip my post:

Welcome to the Room...Sara, was written by Stevie to chronicle her journey through Rehab at Betty Ford, where she checked in under the name Sara Anderson. Her management company, Frontline was instrumental in an intervention. Stevie spent the 28-days in there, but was furious at Frontline and fired them soon after. (According to Mick's autobiography, which must be taken with a grain of salt.)

I love this song also. But then again, I actually like When I See You Again, so what do I know?

Randy

Yeah...it took a little while for me, but I came to love this song. I also like the line "This is a dream right?" I just think it's a nice song, I've never had any problem with it....pretty much that whole album had to come to my liking in time...so yeah...good song!

Well first off i am partial to any song with my name in it:) Really though...i have always liked this song..as much as some of her late 80's songs make me cringe..i think this is a beauty...and the fact that she wrote it about such a personal experience makes it even more so.

Ah, nowww I get it!
 

Thanks to everyone for explaining what the song is actually about! I thought - yeah, it's about her drug problem alright - this song is insane! lol, but now I see it's about the rehab!

Sonia - I agree about Mysitifed. It's not my least favourite...but something tells me we won't be seeing a thread about 'the deeper meaning of Mystified' anytime soon ;) lol

Though not one of Stevie's most accessible songs, I find Welcome To The Room...Sara, to be one her most intriguing songs...certainly one of her best on Tango. The chorus always troubled me...trying to make sense of what she was communicating...then one day it hit me...and I realized that Stevie's wry humor was being completely overlooked!

Take into consideration that her alias during her time at Betty Ford was Sara Anderson, and how she referenced the drama of Gone With The Wind (It's not Tara!).

A little mini movie...

"Welcome to the room...Sara"

This is what the doctor or other personnel say to Stevie when they first greet her in her room at Betty Ford.

"(for Scarlett) Welcome to the choir sir"

This is Stevie's wry retort, referencing the strength and attitude of Scarlett O' Hara, and the fact that she is a well-known singer in "the choir."

An obscure few lines of lyric made clear! Any opinions?

I alwyas liked this song too...
 

But then again, I like "When I See You Again" too!

I was always under the impression that "Welcome to the room" was something they said at AA and NA type meetings when new members entered the group...kinda like welcome to the group. :shrug:

I always liked her delivery of "Oh, I see..." at the end of the first stanza. Vulnerable, resigned, humbled, even embarassed...you can see her drop her eyes as she says it.

And "Of course, it was a problem..." so confessional...

I always thought of "Welcome to the choir, sir" as kind of tounge-in-cheek. I always thought she was picking at the preaching aspect of substance abuse centers.

IMHO this song is a real unique expression of the trials of going through a substance abuse center. It's a real photograph of the inside of the Betty Ford Center. It's bold, a little humourous, self-effacing, and candid. It doesn't have Top 40 written all over it, but man, no one says this stuff like Stevie!

After TITN came out, it was the first time I actually agreed with a Rollingstone Magazine review of Stevie's music in FM up to that point. TITN and WISYA ("baby...baby...baby..baby...baby....")were real dissapointments to me. :o

This song is great. My favorite line is:

"Well, you held her prisoner
And after all these years, well, as well as you knew her
In the never forgotten words of another one of your freinds..."

So true, so relevent to her life back then, all her dealings with Frontline Management

My interpretation (From Stevie's perspective):

~ So you forced me and stuck me in this place I don't want to be, even though we've been freinds for such a long, long time and you knew even before you forced me, you knew I would resent your betrayal. I knew this would happen- told me years ago not to get involved with you....

I know how she feels.....

This song is one of my favorites. I also love the part where she goes "this is a dream, right?.....Dejavu..." Does anyone have the alternate version of this song? The instrumentation isn't as good, but I like a lot the lyrics....like she goes "ohhhhhHHHHHHH missonary" and says "Welcome to the room Everyone" very clearly a few times at the end of the song. How she sings "frontline baby....." is also different. Overall, I like both versions of the song.....

I wouldn't classify that as another "version" of the song. I think we keep forgetting that those demos were not supposed to be heard. It's not another version officially...it's a work in progress. It's a demo. We shouldn't judge one against the other.

It's not one of my favourite songs, but it's not one that I hate alot.

I dont know why I came across this interpretation of the song but I read something on another site that was interesting about this song. Like many of Stevie's songs, they are about multiple experiences rolled into one song.

We all know Welcome to the Room Sara is about her stint at Betty Ford. She checked in under the alias Sara Anderson ....blah blah blah

She takes a swipe at her management team who forced her to go blah blah blah

Now here is the interesting part that I read. Stevie's best friend Sara we all know married Mick the year after this song was written and released. So the time it was written they must have been serious in their relationship. They got married in 1988 so they were probably engaged about the time the song was written.

Welcome to the Room, Sara - could mean the actual room of drug rehab OR it could also mean, Welcome to the madness Sara now you are part of us. Her best friend is now engaged to Mick.

The lines..."I thought you were mine" Could mean a Lindsey reference. Lindsey was still be written about even in later songs like Blue Denim, etc. Or could it mean Mick dumped Stevie for Sara?

The phone line "when you hang up that phone." Has been attributed to a Joe Walsh quote.

So its interesting this song has hidden meanings about everything. Gone With The Wind references with the Tara plantation and Scarlett the main character. So is she taking the strong willed Scarlett or the romantic part which makes it more relationship orientated than we thought.


I dont care for the song but its an interesting window into what was happening in late 1986/early 1987. Instead of creating a new thread, I found this old thread, not in Rumours but Stevie forum.

Can I just say how much I love the resurrection of old threads? It's fun to see the old names of members and remember a different time (and tone) of The Ledge!
Oh and, WTTRS is definitely a weird song, doesn't fit the feel of the Tango album, but doesn't grate like When I See You Again (and can be a little bit of an earworm.) Seven Wonders is really the only song that sounds like it belongs on Tango in my opinion.
Ricoh

I thought I read an interview (and forgive me if it was mentioned here already) that she checked into Betty Ford under the name Sara Anderson. "Welcome to the room" apparently was the greeting they say when you come to group therapy there. Hence "Welcome to the room Sara".

That is the literal interpretation and probably the correct one. I believe she also said that if she had a girl she would have named her Sara. So she took the first name of her aborted baby Sara with the last name of her former husband Anderson.

I never got into the song. Its more spoken poetry than a song to sing. "This is a dream, right! DeJa'Vu"

I think Escape from Berlin is her better rehab song. In any event, its an interesting song to analyze and interpret. When Tango came out, I was a dummy because I never got any of the meaning thus liked the song even less.

It is one of her 2 Tango duds . The plunge from Mirage to Tango was breath taking.

True. 5 years
IMHO the more extreme plunge was Bella Donna to Rock A Little
Good God. One of the best albums from 1981 to one of the worst albums of the entire 80s

Well I just want to say...
... I absolutely bloody love this song.
So deal with it, world!!!
:wavey:

The first cut is the deepest...

Welcome To The Room is the only song to me that fits with the album's cover.

It's my favorite song from Tango:thumbsup:

Frontline Baby!

It was all part of the same precipitous downward trajectory..vocals ,songwriting ,performance. Drugs and grandiosity are not a great combo.

Bella Donna is a f*cking MASTERPIECE. A classic. Yet $he's the poster child for what NOT to do with a career. And somehow, the idiot survived it all. $he should be in the Guinness book of records!

That's interesting. You say that for the mystery of the song?
I am in the tiny minority (maybe I stand alone) that dislikes the Tango cover. Like the song, it's meh. Looking back it was a miracle Lindsey was able to corral everyone to finish it. I sense no one wanted to take time to discuss an album cover and Lindsey selected something. Of all the Mac album covers, its one of my least favorites. I suppose I dislike both the song and cover equally as you like them. Maybe we are on to something. Flame me all you want but BTM is one of their best covers ever :eek: It described the band perfectly which is not the case with Tango. Of all Mac covers, Tango is the least creative. But I understand the issues at hand :lol:
Frontline Baby!

Mystery is a good point, but I feel like the opening of the song and Mick's sounds are like an accompaniment to walking through that rainforest on the cover; almost like being in the Avatar movie.

And the demo sounds nothing like a rainforest. If I had to give the demo some connection to wildlife, maybe it would be a processional for a slow parade of elephants.:thumbsup:

I guess Mystified and Family Man are of that enchanting sound but WTTR, to me, has the best blend of sounds.

Family Man is like Lindsey playing a gig at Studio 54. Mystified is basically a sleep aid.

I totally smell what you are cooking. You are correct, the percussion and keyboards do sound like a rainforest. Family Man and Mystified also fit with the cover.

Lindsey should have taken a photo of Mick buying drugs in his driveway and slapped that on the over. Look over there ---------Piggy in the middle----piggy on the cover!

It’s an interesting song for me because harmonically it’s unusual writing for Stevie. The verse and the chorus are in different keys, which she almost never does, especially in a song she wrote by herself (I think “Sweet Girl” might be another example). That means that for a Stevie song, this has about a GAZILLION chords!

I like it. I also like “When I See You Again” - but we won’t go there right now! :D

I also love seeing some of these old Ledgie names. Wow so long ago.

I always thought of Welcome to the Room...Sara as more of a parody song than anything profound or listenable. To take the name from one of her most beautifully written songs and attach it to a phrase is a big no no for a prolific writer. Add to that the lines from Blue Lamp, a song that was just 6 years old at the time, it was not a good throw back. No amount of production savvy could save this piece of dreck. After making it through the song though, we long time Nicks fans upon first spin of Tango in the Night, were in for something worse, much worse from her. The album was a cap off to a stunning fall from beauty and great music. As an alternate, she had much better material including Running Through the Garden which would've been a better choice, with a Seven Wonders type vocal (although not great by any means, at least salvageable) and fit better flow wise. Welcome to the Room...Sara is a terrible song and absolutely destroys her reputation, although buried in a decent album, it kind of gets skipped over and forgotten.

Wonderful analysis.

Stevie lost me with Bella Donna, frankly, I had been seriously into her until then, but the album was so deadly to my ears, I just drifted away fast.

I even missed her on Mirage, I was overseas at the time and had little access to western pop music. In 1987, back in N America, I saw FM had a new album and I heard Seven Wonders on the radio. I bought the cassette and in the car kept flipping it to get Seven Wonders and WISYA back and forth for hours on a long road trip. They grabbed my attention immediately. That got me back into her and FM. WTTRS helped too, the weird incoherence of it drew me in too. So I bought the stuff I had missed between 1981 and 1987.

The song doesn’t absolutely destroy her reputation. It just doesn’t. Not any more than Family Man ruins Lindsey’s reputation. Besides, Stevie has worse songs than WTTRS! Not picking on you, On Ice, your posts are always fun to read, I just disagree with this one thing.

I don’t hate the song, but I don’t like it a lot, either. Learning it was about her experience at a drug rehab made the song more interesting to me than the actual song itself.

I don't know if I agree on the Mick/Sara connection. Sara had been around and living with Mick since Tusk. I think it's more her talking about her Rehab stint and her anger at Frontline for making her go. What is interesting is her interview with and I can't think of his name, but she told the story of going out with her Dr. and he took her to a house with everyone there to do an intervention and she was so pissed because she had planned on going anyway. I think her parents and other friends and family were there. So I don't know why she was so mad at Frontline. It might have had more to do with them pushing her to tour to make up the money for Rock a little and she blamed them for overworking her.

Bella Donna isn't a bad album but I think it least represents Stevie's sound. (Other than Edge)
Wild Heart and Street Angel I think best represent her sound.
Bella Donna to me sounds like what Iovine was probably making with Bruce or Tom in those days.
After Bella Donna, I think she made all the Mike Campbell collabs sound like her own rather than Petty songs.

And yet it was her biggest hit, BY FAR. It sounds like The Eagles are her backing band. The numbers for it would indicate it's greatness.

I guess there's no accounting for taste...

I've always mostly associated You and I Part 2 with the album cover.

PS, I cant quite tell whether you are being serious or taking the p!ss when you say its your favourite :confused:
I personally wouldn't say its my favourite...that would be Tango In The Night or Isn't It Midnight, but I really do love the song. I like the way it stands out on the album as something of a raw, basic rock song. Its more akin to Behind the Mask (even though I think her BTM material is complete sh!te).