New interview

[SortaSavageLike]

Originally Posted by Johnny Stew

Each of them have always had, on their solo albums, about four or five songs that "only a fan could love."

Per album, or throughout their entire solo careers? Because Bella Donna and Out Of The Cradle seem like they'd be pretty accessible to The Proles.

[strandinthewind]

Affairs of the Heart
After the Glitter Fades
Alice
The Apartment Song - Petty's song
Angel
At Last - cover
Battle of the Dragon
Beautiful Child
Beauty and the Beast
Bella Donna
The Blonde in the Blue T-Bird - harmony
Blue Denim
Blue Lamp
Bombay Sapphires
Book of Miracles (instrumental)
Candlebright
Can't Get Enough - harmony
Casablanca - Dane Donohue - harmony
Cat Dancer - Sandy Stewart - harmony
The Chain
C'mon, C'mon - Sheryl Crow - harmony
Cry Wolf
Crying in the Night
Crystal - 2 versions
Desert Angel
Desiree - Rick Vito - duet
Destiny
Destiny Rules
Devil Wind - Bob Welch - Three Hearts - harmony
Diamond Road - Sheryl Crow - harmony
Docklands
Doing the Best I Can (Escape from Berlin)
Don't Let Me Down Again
Dreams
Edge of Seventeen
Enchanted
Everybody Finds Out
Every Day
Fall From Grace
The Farmer's Daughter
Feel So Good - Walter Egan - harmony
Finally Find a Girlfriend - Walter Egan - harmony
Fire Burning
Fireflies
Free Fallin' - cover
Freedom
Frozen Love
Garbo
Gate and Garden
Get My Way - Sandy Stewart - harmony
Ghosts
God's Garden
Gold - John Stewart - duet
Gold Dust Woman
Gold And Braid
Goodbye Baby
Greta
Gypsy
Has Anyone Ever Written Anything for You
Hello It's Me - Todd Rundgren - harmony
The Highwayman
How Still My Love
Hurry Boy - Tom Snow - harmony
I Can't Wait
I Don't Want to Know
I Miss You
I Need To Know
I Pretend - Sandy Stewart - duet
I Sing for the Things
I Still Miss Someone (Blue Eyes)
I Will Run to You
If Anyone Falls
If I Were You
If You Ever Did Believe
Illume
Imperial Hotel
Insider - Tom Petty - duet/harmony
Inspiration
Intuition - Rick Vito - harmony
It's Late
It's Only Love
Jane
Juliet
Just Like a Woman
Just the Wanting - Walter Egan - harmony
Kick It
Kind of Woman
Landslide
Lay Down Your Arms - cover and harmony
Leather and Lace
Let Me Count the Ways - Dave Koz - duet
Listen to the Rain
Long Distance Winner
Long Way to Go
Love Changes
Love Is
Love Is Dangerous
Love Is Like a River
Love's a Hard Game to Play
Magnet and Steel - Walter Egan - harmony
Maybe Love Will Change Your Mind
Midnight Wind - John Stewart - harmont/duet
Mirror, Mirror
Mohammed's Radio - Warren Zevon - duet
My Little Saviour - Jesse Camp - duet
Needles and Pins - Tom Petty - duet
Nightbird
The Nightmare
No Questions Asked
No Spoken Word
Not Make Believe
Nothing Ever Changes
One More Big Time Rock and Roll Star
Only the Lucky - Walter Egan - duet
Ooh My Love
Outside the Rain
Paper Doll
Planets of the Universe
Races are Run
Real Tears
Reconsider Me
Rhiannon
Rock a Little
Rock and Roll - cover
Rooms on Fire
Rose Garden
Rosanna - Tom Snow - harmony
Running Through the Garden
Sable on Blond
Sara
Say You Will
The Second Time
Secret - Robin Zander - harmony
Separate Lives - harmony
Seven Wonders
Silent Night - cover
Silver Girl
Silver Springs
Sister Honey
Sisters of the Moon
Sleeping Angel
Smile At You
Smiling Islands - Robbie Patton - duet
Some Become Strangers
Somebody Stand By Me
Sometimes It's a Bitch
Sorcerer
Stand Back
Star in the Dust - Walter Egan - harmony
Stop Draggin' My Heart Around
Storms
Straight Back
Street Angel
Strong Enough - Sheryl Crow - harmony
Sweet Girl
Talk to Me
That's Alright
That Made me Stronger
Think About It
Thousand Days
Thrown Down
Too Far from Texas
Touched by an Angel
Trouble in Shangri-La
Tunnel of Love - Walter Egan - harmony
Twisted
Two Kinds of Love
Unconditional Love
Violet and Blue
Welcome to the Room...Sara
When I Get My Wheels - Walter Egan - harmony
When I see You Again
Whenever I Call You Friend
Whole Lotta Trouble
Wild Heart
Without a Leg to Stand On
Woman - Dane Donohue - harmony
Won't You Say You Will - Walter Egan - harmony
You Can Still Change Your Mind - Petty - harmony
You Like Me (1987) written by Stevie Nicks, recorded by the Williams Brothers w/out Stevie
You're Not The One
______________________________________________________

I tried to make that accurate. Count them as you will. I submit that most of the harmony stuff does not count as one of her songs per se, but it is still time she was spending not doing her own stuff while LB was doing his own stuff, unless LB worked with her a la Magnet and Steel. So, take that for what it is worth.

[Sugar]

^^^

Oh holy crap.

Since we were talking about quality of their songs along with the number of songs I only counted songs with at least a co-writing credit, i.e. Some Become Strangers and I Am Waiting didn't make my list.

[Johnny Stew]

Originally Posted by SortaSavageLike

Per album, or throughout their entire solo careers? Because Bella Donna and Out Of The Cradle seem like they'd be pretty accessible to The Proles.

I meant on average.

'Bella Donna' and 'Out Of The Cradle' would definitely be exceptions to that rule, though I'd venture to say that those two albums have maybe one or two "only a fan could love" songs apiece.

[Johnny Stew]

Originally Posted by Sugar

Since we were talking about quality of their songs along with the number of songs I only counted songs with at least a co-writing credit, i.e. Some Become Strangers and I Am Waiting didn't make my list.

I agree -- the conversation should be kept to songs that they've had a hand in penning.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by Sugar

^^^

Oh holy crap.

Since we were talking about quality of their songs along with the number of songs I only counted songs with at least a co-writing credit, i.e. Some Become Strangers and I Am Waiting didn't make my list.

I am so anal

Seriously though, I agree anbd think the songs she actually wrote count more. But, she likely spent an entire year or so (cummulatively) working on other peoples' stuff - so that should factor in somehow - maybe add five songs to her self written total.

[MacMan]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I have always though she meant that from the contect of the 19 layers of guitar work that took six years to create were more important to him than the phrasing of the lyric. He has said that they write so differently and that is the difference.

I think I read once where Lindsey said or someone said that he will come up with the music and write the lyrics around that... whereas Stevie will do the opposite...she have the words, then work on a melody... Not sure if that makes a difference in how a song will turn out or not.

[MacMan]

Originally Posted by Sugar

To say that he "doesn't care" might be a bit much, but I think we can all see from the demos that she starts with the lyrics and minimal (oh so minimal ) instrumentation, while he usually has the instrumentation worked out while singing along with nonsense words.

Ooops... Should have read further down... You said what I was thinking..

[shackin'up]

OK ignore my posts. but read this:

If you are thinking LB's songwriting can be seperated from playing with 19 layers of guitar, you still don't understand the man.

If you think his work lacks intensity, you just know ONE kind if intensity. The obvious one.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by MacMan

I think I read once where Lindsey said or someone said that he will come up with the music and write the lyrics around that... whereas Stevie will do the opposite...she have the words, then work on a melody... Not sure if that makes a difference in how a song will turn out or not.

I think it does. I think Stevie's way is a poem set to music. LB's is less poetic if you will.

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by shackin'up

OK ignore my posts. but read this:

If you are thinking LB's songwriting can be seperated from playing with 19 layers of guitar, you still don't understand the man.

If you think his work lacks intensity, you just know ONE kind if intensity. The obvious one.

1. I never said his lyrics could be sep. like that. But, certainly his musical songwriting can on some level as the man is known to layer sound. It is is strongsuit in fact. Why is saying that incorrect or an nsult

2. I never said anything about his or intensity. Maybe you were addressing someone else with that. I think his songs are very dense and intense. His lyrics, for the most part, not so much - though Go Insane and ISA certainly are - but Trouble and Family Man are not.

[SortaSavageLike]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

2. I never said anything about his or intensity...but Trouble and Family Man are not.

Hold on a minute. Trouble is the darkest, most gruesome, gritty, intense, soul-ripping song Lindsey has ever written. Do we ever really learn why he's in so much trouble? Or why he must arrive...on the double? Or under what circumstances he managed to forget what love is for?

The song is obviously about a bank heist gone horribly wrong. I think what Lindsey is saying that if he doesn't get to his mob boss "on the double," he'll be in a "lot of trouble," and one of his henchmen will kill someone very close to him, which will eventually force him to "forget about love was for." What a depressing song!

[David]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I think it does. I think Stevie's way is a poem set to music. LB's is less poetic if you will.

It's popular these days to talk of poetry beyond literary genres. So for example we hear about poetic films, poetry in sculpture, in dance (the phrase "poetry in motion"), in theater, even in television & advertisements. Is it so farfetched to talk in all seriousness of Lindsey's poetry in orchestration & guitar playing? Plus, what makes the words to "Soul Drifter" any less poetic than those to "Kind of Woman" or "Sleeping Angel"? "Poetic" doesn't always have to remind you of autumn moons & ravens perched in oak trees. If the word is going to be used for Stevie's words, then there is also poetry in Christine's singing & playing, & in Mick's drumming. That's all poetry in the wide-ranging, popular sense. Take Lindsey's annoying & incessant description of his art -- painting on a canvas -- as seriously as it deserves. It is actually a very accurate metaphor for what he does. He "paints" (no other word for it) on tape (or nowadays on digital media).

But one of the criticisms I have of Lindsey's poetry is that, despite his obvious musical intelligence & urge to explore the new, he has almost never gone beyond the (to me) limiting boundary of popular music. Only here & there & only in bits & pieces has he stepped in deeper waters--like his musique concrete mini-experiment on his 2nd solo album, & his borrowings of classical themes. But even those have been diatonic & not chromatic (the more adventurous style for contemporary pop composers like David Byrne & Frank Zappa).

For example, I would have expected a major, lengthy instrumental piece from Lindsey after all these years.I'm not just talking "Book of Love" or something that's in effect a pop song without singing. I'm talking a serious instrumental composition, taken at length (rather than instrumental "breaks" like those in the D.W. Suite). This is what I would expect, not from someone who considers himself primarily a songwriter (like Springsteen) but from someone who clearly thinks in sonic/textural terms rather than verbal ones.

I imagine wonderful things from him if he had chosen to compose, say, film scores all these years. Instead, we get a lot of retro conservatism from guys like Howard Shore & James Newton Howard. But Lindsey had the ability to create movie scores that you could talk about seriously, like the renaissance in scoring for the French New Wave when songwriters like Jean Constantin & Maurice Jarre created experimental but hugely popular scores that were equal to the characters in importance. But, heckers, he didn't ....

[Sugar]

^^^ I think you just made Jason's point...

[strandinthewind]

^^^

I agree with you. I was, however, referring to the fact that La Nicks states she takes journal entries and turns them into poems. Then, she writes a melody to fit her poetry. So, they start out as poems. LB's, from what I have heard, do not. Rather, they are a product of the music. So, that is where I was getting her poems are perhaps truer poetry because they started out that way, perhaps like some of the Psalms, which are now only mostly spoken.

I do think, though, that LB's poetry, in a borader sense, is in his layering of music.

I agree that it would heavenly if he did something along the lines of Steinman's epic "Bat out of Hell" - perhaps done very simply with a cello, celesta (the French four octave), tympany, and him on acoustic guitar. If there must be woodwinds, I suggest an oboe. If we must be modern, then a glockenspiel could suffice in crescendo, which I suggest will be many. I think this would give the mad musician something very different - Ersatz if you will.