Quote:
Originally posted by dissention
The sound on her albums is dictated by what's currently popular most of the time.
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Again, does 'Rock A Little' sound
anything like "Like A Virgin," "Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go," or Chaka Khan's "I Feel For You"... which were massive hits in the two years Stevie was recording her album?
And can you honestly say that the sound of 'The Other Side Of The Mirror' is what was popular in 1989, and that the sound of 'Street Angel' is what was popular in 1994?
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying Stevie was trying to be "experimental," and I'm also not saying that she was entirely oblivious to what was popular.... but, I also don't believe that she deliberately set out to copy a particular style.
After all, what album released in the mid to late-80s
didn't have a synthesizer or programmed drum pattern? Certainly not 'Go Insane.'
To my ears, there's no mistaking that the sound of a Stevie Nicks album is unlike the sound of anything else on the radio at any given time.
Quote:
Originally posted by dissention
RAL was edgy? Now I can die and say that I've heard it all. I think that most people who grew up listening to 80s musci would laugh at that statement and then tell you how un-edgy that album was in restrospect. At that time frame, it was the hair bands that were edgy, not blonde singers who sang about letting down their hair and taking off capes.
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When 'Rock A Little' was released, hair-bands were still about two years away from becoming what would be considered "mainstream," so they really have no place in this discussion. Besides, Stevie wasn't heavy metal, so it doesn't make sense to compare her album to a completely different genre of music.
And when I referred to "edginess," I was referring to the
sound of the album, not the subject-matter of Stevie's lyrics, which is never going to sound edgy... especially not to folks who prefer listening to Dokken and Judas Priest.
I feel the
album sounds "edgy" because it does not sound like any other
Top 20 pop-rock album from 1985/1986.
Quote:
Originally posted by dissention
I absolutely agree (about 'Go Insane' sounding dated). But put ('Rock A Little' and 'Go Insane') next to each other and compare the originality put into making each one, and Go Insane wins by a landslide (no pun intended!).
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With 'Go Insane' Lindsey is really only taking things he had already been doing, and expanding upon them.
He had already been tinkering with VSOs (his altered voice on the "come on and," parts of "Hold Me," for example, and various sounds on 'Tusk' and 'Law And Order'), and he didn't invent the idea of channel-panning vocals.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying the album wasn't brilliantly produced (listen to it with your headphones on, and your mouth will drop), but many of the things folks cite as being wholly original, really aren't... Lindsey was just taking already established techniques (though not necessarily widely-used ones) and running with them.
And it's all wrapped up with sythesizers, keyboards, and drum-machines... which were very much a part of what was popular at the time.
But... if it's been lost in my comments, the crux of what I'm trying to say here, is that both Lindsey AND Stevie recorded albums that, while not being totally apart from sounds that were popular at the time, were also quite different when compared to what their peers were doing.
Lindsey just happened to take things a couple steps further with his project (as he tends to do).