Tusk at 40: FM's defining record

[bombaysaffires]

Originally Posted by Macfan4life

IMHO when you leave tracks in their organic or raw form, its the definition of under produced. The amount of time on the double album has nothing to do with the production value. We don't mean underproduced as being less effort. I think you are saying Lindsey over produced the album to purposely make it sound less polished?

Yes that's what I and many others mean when we say it is a highly produced album. They didn't leave the songs in a raw state meaning that they went in and did some rough takes and then put those out. Make no mistake everything on there is deliberate and polished. They recorded a lot of backing vocals and instrumental tracks and Lindsey played around with how many to layer in (or not). And even on the songs that you THINK are really minimalist and only have a couple things on them it's not the case. It's hard to imagine but it takes a lot of layers to sound like it's only a few. It's like women who you'd swear aren't wearing any makeup at all and just look naturally flawless, when in reality there are layers and layers of foundation and contouring and highlighter and 6 shades of neutral eyeshadow and eyeliner that look like she's wearing no eye make up at all.

[David]

Originally Posted by bombaysaffires

Yes that's what I and many others mean when we say it is a highly produced album. They didn't leave the songs in a raw state meaning that they went in and did some rough takes and then put those out. Make no mistake everything on there is deliberate and polished. They recorded a lot of backing vocals and instrumental tracks and Lindsey played around with how many to layer in (or not). And even on the songs that you THINK are really minimalist and only have a couple things on them it's not the case. It's hard to imagine but it takes a lot of layers to sound like it's only a few. It's like women who you'd swear aren't wearing any makeup at all and just look naturally flawless, when in reality there are layers and layers of foundation and contouring and highlighter and 6 shades of neutral eyeshadow and eyeliner that look like she's wearing no eye make up at all.

Good way to put it—good analogy. I think we’re all on the same page. The production label includes things like the arrangements or orchestrations, which involve deciding which instruments to incorporate, setting levels, deciding how (or whether) to combine instruments or vocals (double-tracking, triple-tracking, quadruple-tracking), instrumental costuming (creating the illusion of one instrument with another), and so on.

Over and Over may have a lot of thinking behind it and a lot of conscious craftsmanship involved in its recording, but it’s arranged to sound as if you were only hearing a basic combo: drums, bass, electronic piano, organ, acoustic guitar, an electric guitar or two, a lead vocal and some harmonies. It has a natural, ad hoc feel—kind of a “take it from the top” live feel, which is something that Fleetwood Mac usually does not do. What you usually hear is an entire novel of sound ideas where pieces of instrumentation or vocals are stripped or combined in ways that the listener feels more than hears. Fleetwood Mac is the idea band. They must have thousands of ideas in a year of being in the studio, and I bet they put the majority of those ideas on tape. But months later, they may remove a bunch of them, too (think of the way the kit brushes were removed from Never Going Back Again).

Sometimes they go wrong for my personal taste. Why isn’t there a chunkier, more prominent piano on Love in Store? It fairly cries out for it.

[bombaysaffires]

Originally Posted by David

Sometimes they go wrong for my personal taste. Why isn’t there a chunkier, more prominent piano on Love in Store? It fairly cries out for it.

Ugh this song is one of my personal bugaboos as well... it just doesn't work. It sounds to me very..... empty. Lots of unfilled spaces. Cold. Unfinished. Especially on an album so full of plinks and plops and all sorts of sounds (like Gypsy).

[TrueFaith77]

I consider TUSK the greatest album of all time--three distinct perspectives on romance at their artistic peak aligned, not by the radical soap-opera narrative of RUMOURS, but by the buoying sound of a strings-like harmonizing. It constitutes a total social vision.

But I couldn't bring myself to celebrate its 40th anniversary with a listening session.

They broke my heart, so I don't know how my ears will hear it now.

It may be overtaken in my estimation by Roxy Music's SIREN--the most perfect expression of the most refined (romantic) sensibility of the 20th Century. It's a great album about desire and heartbreak that can be heard without suffering the personal betrayal of heartbreak.

[David]

Originally Posted by TrueFaith77

I consider TUSK the greatest album of all time--three distinct perspectives on romance at their artistic peak aligned, not by the radical soap-opera narrative of RUMOURS, but by the buoying sound of a strings-like harmonizing. It constitutes a total social vision.

In formalistic terms, is Tusk completely successful — does it achieve or even exceed all its aesthetic goals? Or does its greatness lie at least in part in its folly: in its excesses, its miscalculations, its exhausting grandeur? (The critics at the time hinted at this by comparing it, as you know, to the Beatles’ fractious 1968 studio album The Beatles.)

To me, the link between form and content in Rumours seems insoluble. There is no loose formalistic thread whose teensy bit of unraveling subverts the album’s content. Even the botched production treatment of “Songbird” doesn’t undercut any of the album’s statements (I say it’s botched because, taken by itself, it sticks out sonically like a sore thumb — it lacks the tight compression of the hermetic studio environment and the Appalachian mountain music alchemy of the multitracking, yet it’s still weirdly and entirely of a piece with the rest of the album).

But in Tusk there’s a distracting tension between the work itself and the maze of incompatibilities feeding our aural, visual, and intellectual sensibilities (most often attributed to the differences among the three writers and their aging voices). Does the album’s greatness as a cultural artifact lie in its boastful display of incommensurates? Tusk feels like a folly — many of rock’s most influential works are glorious follies that push the borders of the art outward. And should “Not That Funny” have been . . . well, funnier?

Say, this is fun!

[Villavic]

[HomerMcvie]

Originally Posted by Villavic

That David. He sure do have a way with words, don't he?

David

[David]

I could have worded it all more clearly, I suppose. But I wanted to engage with John when he said it was the greatest album of all time. It’s not that I agree or disagree but that I want to hear more from John. He’s written some good books!

[aleuzzi]

Originally Posted by David

In formalistic terms, is Tusk completely successful — does it achieve or even exceed all its aesthetic goals? Or does its greatness lie at least in part in its folly: in its excesses, its miscalculations, its exhausting grandeur? (The critics at the time hinted at this by comparing it, as you know, to the Beatles’ fractious 1968 studio album The Beatles.)

To me, the link between form and content in Rumours seems insoluble. There is no loose formalistic thread whose teensy bit of unraveling subverts the album’s content. Even the botched production treatment of “Songbird” doesn’t undercut any of the album’s statements (I say it’s botched because, taken by itself, it sticks out sonically like a sore thumb — it lacks the tight compression of the hermetic studio environment and the Appalachian mountain music alchemy of the multitracking, yet it’s still weirdly and entirely of a piece with the rest of the album).

But in Tusk there’s a distracting tension between the work itself and the maze of incompatibilities feeding our aural, visual, and intellectual sensibilities (most often attributed to the differences among the three writers and their aging voices). Does the album’s greatness as a cultural artifact lie in its boastful display of incommensurates? Tusk feels like a folly — many of rock’s most influential works are glorious follies that push the borders of the art outward. And should “Not That Funny” have been . . . well, funnier?

Say, this is fun!

True, dat, as the kids [used to] say.

Rumours achieves a remarkable coherence through synthesis. The various parts come together. And yes, "Songbird" is sonically different from all the rest, but its placement directly after the album's most raucous, bombastic moment feels deliberate...

By contrast, Tusk achieves fragmentation through fragmentation. The various parts are adjacent but not in conversation. The result is one jarring juxtaposition after another, the story of how these five very different people, and specifically the three songwriters DON'T organically fit together. THIS is Tusk's aesthetic goal. The result is fascinating and, oddly, enduring.

Contemporary reviewers noted similarities with the Beatles White Album but were often careful enough to recognize Tusk was lyrically superficial by comparison. On the other hand, the individual writers on the double Beatles album manage to forge a unified sound--one that is grungier, simpler, and spacier than their previous masterwork. With Tusk, you have different sonic approaches: proto-punk bathroom concoctions; Brian Wilson tributes; L.A. studio sophistication worthy of Steely Dan. It's all over the place...And I love it because of this.

[David]

Originally Posted by aleuzzi

True, dat, as the kids [used to] say.

Rumours achieves a remarkable coherence through synthesis. The various parts come together. And yes, "Songbird" is sonically different from all the rest, but its placement directly after the album's most raucous, bombastic moment feels deliberate...

By contrast, Tusk achieves fragmentation through fragmentation. The various parts are adjacent but not in conversation. The result is one jarring juxtaposition after another, the story of how these five very different people, and specifically the three songwriters DON'T organically fit together. THIS is Tusk's aesthetic goal. The result is fascinating and, oddly, enduring.

Contemporary reviewers noted similarities with the Beatles White Album but were often careful enough to recognize Tusk was lyrically superficial by comparison. On the other hand, the individual writers on the double Beatles album manage to forge a unified sound--one that is grungier, simpler, and spacier than their previous masterwork. With Tusk, you have different sonic approaches: proto-punk bathroom concoctions; Brian Wilson tributes; L.A. studio sophistication worthy of Steely Dan. It's all over the place...And I love it because of this.

Beautifully stated, Tony. “The various parts are adjacent but not in conversation.” Both Robert Hilburn and Noel Coppage thought the fragmentation was a weakness. With a lot of time behind us, it’s not a weakness any more. The idea that even forward-thinking critics considered it so in 1979 illustrates just how powerful the unity of form and content on Rumours really was. The “not fitting together” quality really is the aesthetic goal, as you said. The craze for paring down the album to a single album or rearranging the track list maybe doesn’t see the point? You shouldn’t want to turn Tusk into an album that’s any more palatable to a mass audience or a boardroom full of radio execs. The album is anti-single and anti-radio. If it had sold at Rumours level, a good argument could be made that it had failed at its goal.

[ViscountViktor]

Originally Posted by David

To me, the link between form and content in Rumours seems insoluble. There is no loose formalistic thread whose teensy bit of unraveling subverts the album’s content. Even the botched production treatment of “Songbird” doesn’t undercut any of the album’s statements (I say it’s botched because, taken by itself, it sticks out sonically like a sore thumb — it lacks the tight compression of the hermetic studio environment and the Appalachian mountain music alchemy of the multitracking, yet it’s still weirdly and entirely of a piece with the rest of the album).

This is really interesting to read coming from someone who is obviously very knowledgeable about music.

I've always hated the compressed vocals on Rumours - they stick out like a sore thumb compared to other music of the time, and indeed other FM albums with the same producers.

Are you saying that they were a production decision, I always thought they were a result of the high end being lost from the masters being overused?

Originally Posted by BLY

As I was listening to several tracks today from Tusk the one thing I wish Lindsey would have done was to add Christine and Stevie’s vocals to more of his tracks. Save Me a Place, That’s All For Everyone and Walk a Thin Line comes to mind.

And Save Me A Place literally has a 3 part harmony in the chorus which is, you know, Fleetwood Mac's thing. Why did they let Lindsey do all three parts?

[BLY]

[QUOTE=



And Save Me A Place literally has a 3 part harmony in the chorus which is, you know, Fleetwood Mac's thing. Why did they let Lindsey do all three parts?[/QUOTE]


The live versions of this song REALLY showed what the studio version could have been. The three part harmonies were amazing.

[jbrownsjr]

Originally Posted by BLY

The live versions of this song REALLY showed what the studio version could have been. The three part harmonies were amazing.

Absolutely!!!

[ViscountViktor]

Lindsey not letting anyone else sing on his songs post Rumours is one of my biggest Mac bugbears. Think of the harmonies we have missed out on.