a difficult bugger?

[sodascouts]

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

The thing I found curious was that Stevie came to the sessions with fully flushed out demos and was upset by the way Lindsey deviated from them. Stevie, Christine, and Lindsey have all consistently stated over the decades that one of Lindsey’s biggest strengths was taking something completely rudimentary from Stevie (I believe Christine called it “rubbish”) and turning it into something spectacular. That’s always been the way he’s looked at his role in the band. It seems a little bizarre that she went into the sessions that way, especially knowing the core of Lindsey’s material was culled from songs he/they had been working on for at least six years. All three guys, not just Lindsey, seemed a little put off by it.

Another problem is that Lindsey's on a different page than Stevie now musically, and has been for quite some time, when it comes to "sound." He often likes to make things sound unnatural - manipulated vocals, sped up guitar parts, sound effects, etc... she's not into that. Back in the day, his suggestions involved adding interesting harmonies, bridges, guitar parts... but in the recent era, they might also include adding bizarre stuff like the freaky manipulated voice echoing that "What I saw on this journey" verse in "Illume." That was definitely.... different.... and not very "Stevie." So I can kind of see where she might be a little nervous.

On the other hand, she made him promise to leave "Without You" alone and he did... and I think it would have benefited from some tweaking in its arrangement! Not by adding gimmicks, mind you, but by finding ways to make it less repetitive. Lindsey could have helped her with that. These people need to find middle ground!