Band Face Off - Round 12

[face of glass]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I've got say, I have a very difficult time taking your opinion seriously when all you do is quote the same critic over and over again. It's nice that you've found somebody who shares your views on the topic at hand, but can't we discuss Springsteen with you and not your buddy George?

Starostin is the only critic I've seen to make valid points against Springsteen, I haven't found any others (at least in America the traditional school of rock criticism [the Creem/Rolling Stone wing of it] has done nothing but praised Bruce) but of course that is due to my lack of research. If you have other examples of this, I would like you to give me some links.

There are plenty of popular musicians out there who alternate between different modes because they simply have different musical interests. Of course it would be naive to suggest that Springsteen's "flip-flopping," as it were, is not a business decision on some level. But is it really so difficult to believe that the man likes making both loud punchy rock music as well as quieter acoustic material?

The interesting thing is that he RARELY dares to combine them on the same album and therefore doesn't want to give an impression of true diversity, instead he prefers to split these distinct sides of his to half in order to not alienate certain parts of his audience. This isn't to say an album like The River doesn't have parts of both but hell, it's a double album anyway.

Finally, none of this is to say that I don't respect Bruce (or for that matter, George Starostin doesn't respect Bruce; he also gives several high ratings to certain Bruce albums) as an artist. After all, very few people would dare to cover material like "Frankie Teardrop" or "Dream Baby Dream". That for me is reason enough to recognize his artistry.

[Jyqm]

Originally Posted by face of glass

Starostin is the only critic I've seen to make valid points against Springsteen, I haven't found any others (at least in America the traditional school of rock criticism [the Creem/Rolling Stone wing of it] has done nothing but praised Bruce) but of course that is due to my lack of research. If you have other examples of this, I would like you to give me some links.

No! I think you missed my point. I was saying I wish you would just post your own thoughts on Springsteen, whether or not they mirror Starostin's. It's a bit more engaging to have this discussion with each other rather than me discussing Starostin's quotes with you acting merely as a middleman.

The interesting thing is that he RARELY dares to combine them on the same album and therefore doesn't want to give an impression of true diversity, instead he prefers to split these distinct sides of his to half in order to not alienate certain parts of his audience. This isn't to say an album like The River doesn't have parts of both but hell, it's a double album anyway.

I think you're drawing the wrong conclusions here. I don't think Springsteen's bipolar album releases reflect a lack of willingness on his part to demonstrate his own diversity, nor do I think he's intentionally trying to split his fanbase. (On tour, that's another issue; his current tour is very clearly meant for die-hard appreciative fans, and not the casual E Street folks who just want to hear the hits.) The reason he splits these distinct sides of his music is precisely because he sees them as distinct sides. Springsteen is someone who has always been very conscious of making his albums cohesive pieces of work (Human Touch being really the only exception). An album that interspersed E Street party rockers (or even more "serious" and "dark" E Street rockers) with bleak acoustic material would probably sound totally incoherent to Bruce's ears (probably to mine as well). I don't see how splitting up material that is so musically different somehows fails to demonstrate diversity. After all, would you claim that Elvis Costello is failing to present his true musical diversity because he didn't release his Delivery Man songs on one album with his Il Sogno ballet?

In addition, there's also the issue of the institution of the E Street Band to contend with. Especially at this point in Bruce's career, this is a big group of people who all have their own lives going on. They're not at Bruce's beck and call every day of the year. So when he recruits them for a project, I think he feels that it should be a project totally dedicated to that band aesthetic. He can get the most of the band that he possibly can, and then he can focus on a solo project and let them all get back to their other lives of smooth jazz albums and late night talk shows and mob killings.

I think I've got a lot of other scrambled thoughts about this, and I could probably go on for paragraphs, but I think my point is simply that it's far too reductive simply to say, "Well, Springsteen splits his albums into rockers and folkers because he doesn't want to be seen as diverse and doesn't want to alienate certain parts of his fanbase." (And to me neither of those claims makes a lick of sense. The fact that he releases such startlingly different albums DOES demonstrate his diversity quite plainly, and the fact that he releases albums made up entirely of dark acoustic material DOES alienate a large part of his fan base.) (And anyway, after the Vote for Change tour last year, I think it's a bit silly to claim that Bruce is afraid of alienating certain parts of his fanbase.)

[face of glass]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

No! I think you missed my point. I was saying I wish you would just post your own thoughts on Springsteen, whether or not they mirror Starostin's. It's a bit more engaging to have this discussion with each other rather than me discussing Starostin's quotes with you acting merely as a middleman.

Well, you got me there. I have no real opinion on Springsteen, there are times when I feel totally indifferent to the man. I have completely ripped off my opinion and my arguments from George Starostin and have shamelessly done that for years. In fact, everything I've posted at the Ledge has been ripped off from someone else. Do look at my posting history for further proof.

If you so much care for this discussion, I suggest that you contact George Starostin himself on this matter. After all, his site does allow reader comments as well. Should you have interesting points to raise (which I'm sure you do because you did that in this thread as well), I'm sure he will post them on his site and probably even answer some of them. And if you do decide to post something, I will follow the discussion with great interest.

Originally Posted by Jyqm

The reason he splits these distinct sides of his music is precisely because he sees them as distinct sides. Springsteen is someone who has always been very conscious of making his albums cohesive pieces of work (Human Touch being really the only exception).

Ah yes, this is the traditional explanation for an artist not being diverse in his/her albums. That he/she is doing "mood pieces" and prefers not to dilute the concept by going into different directions emotionally. Not that there's anything really wrong with the approach, when done with skill and the right amount of integrity it can be as moving as any other approach. It's just that I will always find it far less braver than true diversity.

An album that interspersed E Street party rockers (or even more "serious" and "dark" E Street rockers) with bleak acoustic material would probably sound totally incoherent to Bruce's ears (probably to mine as well). I don't see how splitting up material that is so musically different somehows fails to demonstrate diversity. After all, would you claim that Elvis Costello is failing to present his true musical diversity because he didn't release his Delivery Man songs on one album with his Il Sogno ballet?

With Costello there you're speaking of musical styles that have completely different aesthetic values and ways of enjoyment.
However, to say that the types of rockers you are talking about are incompatible with "bleak acoustic material" is pretty much a false notion to me. Hell, that's what Neil Young did with Rust Never Sleeps and the two sides certainly do not sound incompatible to me. Granted, it's not exactly the bleakness of On The Beach or Tonight's The Night but still dark enough.
Furthermore, from the mid-'60s to early '70s it was actually acceptable to be truly diverse in rock and roll. That is what albums like The Beatles' White Album were after, they were to represent different sides of various personalities, a grand palette of various emotions, a schizophrenic musical diversity. On something like The White Album you will find party-rockers ("Back In The USSR", "Birthday"), bleak rockers ("Yer Blues", "Helter Skelter"), quiet acoustic numbers ("Long Long Long", "Blackbird"), string-laden ballads ("Martha My Dear", "Good Night"), country-influenced numbers ("Rocky Raccoon", "Don't Pass Me By"), depressed songs ("I'm So Tired", "Sexy Sadie"), a ska experiment ("Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da") and even a sonic collage to top things off ("Revolution 9"). All sitting comfortable next to each other. And this was possible because in this era there was a belief that a new musical style was on the cusp of its emergence, it would be something that would combine elements of every possible style in existence and create something new out of that. Of course, such a style never occurred in the first place, it was a doomed idea because the hippie culture got fragmented into several different subcultures that all began to listen to different styles of music instead of digging all those same bands that had existed in the '60s.
This is just to tell you that it IS possible to combine several different styles on the same album without coming off as too fragmented or too desperate in trying to give "something for everybody" (="nothing for anyone").

...I think my point is simply that it's far too reductive simply to say, "Well, Springsteen splits his albums into rockers and folkers because he doesn't want to be seen as diverse and doesn't want to alienate certain parts of his fanbase." (And to me neither of those claims makes a lick of sense. The fact that he releases such startlingly different albums DOES demonstrate his diversity quite plainly, and the fact that he releases albums made up entirely of dark acoustic material DOES alienate a large part of his fan base.)

After the hippie culture dissolved into a fragmented mess, so did the target group ideology in a proper and very obvious way enter the record industry. So there were several subcultures (which exist with plenty of additional ones today) that the record industry began to market things to. Anyone who is in the music business and actually releases something, whether through minor or major labels, has a target group. It's just that some have bigger target groups than others. And all of these target groups respond to very different emotions and more often than not they will shut off other emotions and expressions from their musical maps.

(This is why Lindsey Buckingham NEVER had a chance of making it big, especially in the post-hippie musical climate. On Buckingham's albums [and also on the Fleetwood Mac albums he appears on] his playfulness and hyperactivity, his spiritual uplift, his naivete his happiness and smoothness, but also his violence, paranoia, depression and possessiveness are fully audible to our ears. And this is also why I will always respect Lindsey more than I respect David Bowie [even though I love him too], the supposed "chameleon of rock". To me Bowie is a genre-hopper, a guy who appears on the surface to be diverse but who has been afraid to be diverse within albums.)

To me Bruce is playing the game just like the rest of them. He releases a loud brawling rock album, establishes a target group for himself, then releases a quiet acoustic album and works within another target group. And I can't see why it would alienate audiences just like that; one would think that at this point people would have gotten used to the usual pattern that Bruce has in the release of his albums. Surely they can already tell the difference and why they need to stay away from whatever side of Bruce they don't like. Not to mention that it's not too different in terms of genres in the first place.

At least Dylan and Young had the nerve to release VERY atypical albums at some points in their careers, there is nothing like the self-deflation of Self-Portrait or Re-Ac-Tor or Trans (just go and look at the lyrics to "T-Bone" that Gerald posted) in Springsteen's catalogue. And that is because he's WAY too busy being the deep poet all the time.

The point is, I will always have more respect for the pop eccentric who demonstrates several sides of his/her personality on one album than I have for those who work within target groups by releasing non-diverse albums. People will always buy more of the albums that are non-diverse (because they want more of the same after having heard one song from a particular album) than of the truly diverse expressions of the human mind. Even though these ways of expression can be equally moving when both are done well.

But then resurrecting this already-old thread isn't anything but yet another of my desperate attempts to write a meandering post and get the last word on everything. In other words, the usual Gaius tactics.