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Post by guest on Feb 23, 2015 19:41:47 GMT -5
Linda's version of this song is perfection--beautiful in everyway. Surprised it didn't chart higher. I loved her version from the Letterman show in 1994:
One of my favourites from her.
What do you guys think?
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Post by erik on Feb 23, 2015 20:00:51 GMT -5
"Oh No, Not My Baby" is a great track on a great album (Winter Light) that was terribly underrated upon its release near the end of 1993. In fact, it really seems that Linda, for whatever reasons (her health problems had begun to show up; her music styles were constantly shifting and out of lockstep with the 1990s, etc.), really began to fall off the musical radar in that time. It is a really terrible shame that this album, as well as 1998's We Ran, didn't get its just due, at least not from the public anyway (IMHO).
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Post by fabtastique on Feb 24, 2015 0:06:17 GMT -5
I was always so amazed at how poorly Winter Light performed - it is an outstanding album, with great songs and wonderful vocals by Linda.
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Post by Richard W on Feb 24, 2015 9:28:46 GMT -5
Agreed, Sean & Erik. Winter Light is a later-career classic.
On this song, I love the way she calls into question the confidence the narrator apparently expresses about her "baby" in the line "well you might have had a last-minute fling, but I am sure it doesn't mean a thing, 'cause yesterday you gave me your ring, now I'm glad that I kept on saying..."
Somehow Linda invests those lines with a willful blindness to her lover's infidelity, and colors the happiness of receiving the ring with a shade of doubt.
Anyone else read it that way?
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Post by eddiejinnj on Feb 26, 2015 10:02:24 GMT -5
I read it that way too rich!!!! eddiejinnj
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Post by jhar26 on Mar 3, 2015 3:05:26 GMT -5
Winter Light is underrated (in terms of sales figures and chart action) because people were confused by her constant genre hopping. They didn't know what box to put her in anymore. And even more importantly imo - because of her health problems she all of a sudden no longer looked like the girl on the cover of Hasten Down the Wind. That may be shallow, but many fans of popular music are just that.
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Post by erik on Mar 3, 2015 9:38:55 GMT -5
Quote by jhar26:
Certainly that became true in the 1990s, when image became the over-encompassing thing, and when both the industry and, even to a large extent, the public itself went back to genre classification. Linda pretty much suffered from slow record sales basically from that point on, but that doesn't reflect on the quality of a lot of the stuff she did during that time (IMHO).
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Post by Richard W on Mar 3, 2015 11:51:29 GMT -5
I don't see it so much as the consequence of "genre hopping" as that of popular music taking left turns toward genres (grunge, dance, electronica) that left Linda's patented brand of interpretive pop music behind. There is a definite retro feel to WL that felt out of step in the musical landscape of the '90s. It sounded "old school" when that term was gaining traction. Bacharach/David just did not cut it, hipster-wise, next to Nirvana and Madonna.
That said, it's a top 5 Ronstadt album for me and remains one of the most melodic albums ever, unfortunately released when melody essentially succombed to rhythm, minimal electric guitar chords, and spectacle.
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Post by erik on Mar 4, 2015 10:04:44 GMT -5
Quote by Richard W:
And I don't think we can discount the critics. As much as we like to think they don't have much an impact on what the public thinks, the truth is that they do. For a while, some of them (whom I will mercifully not name) considered Linda "dilettantish" (as if Madonna wasn't?). And we have often had a near-impossible job of convincing them otherwise because, as Upton Sinclair once famously said: "It's difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on him not understanding it."
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Post by jhar26 on Mar 4, 2015 10:23:18 GMT -5
Quote by Richard W: And I don't think we can discount the critics. As much as we like to think they don't have much an impact on what the public thinks, the truth is that they do. For a while, some of them (whom I will mercifully not name) considered Linda "dilettantish" (as if Madonna wasn't?). And we have often had a near-impossible job of convincing them otherwise because, as Upton Sinclair once famously said: " It's difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on him not understanding it." Winter Light got positive reviews though. I also think that they got the singles policy wrong. Heartbeats Accelerating was while good much too arty to be the first single imo. They should have gone for IJDKWTDWM instead. It would have been huge in the at the time power ballad crazy world of pop. Same for the Cry Like a Rainstorm album. Why two Neville duets in a row? When I first heard that album I thought, "Boy, this album is going to be huge. Most tracks are potential hit singles." The album WAS huge, but it could have been even "huge-er" with, say, Still Within the Sound of my Voice as the second single. |
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Post by sliderocker on Mar 4, 2015 21:03:11 GMT -5
Winter Light got positive reviews though. I also think that they got the singles policy wrong. Heartbeats Accelerating was while good much too arty to be the first single imo. They should have gone for IJDKWTDWM instead. It would have been huge in the at the time power ballad crazy world of pop. Same for the Cry Like a Rainstorm album. Why two Neville duets in a row? When I first heard that album I thought, "Boy, this album is going to be huge. Most tracks are potential hit singles." The album WAS huge, but it could have been even "huge-er" with, say, Still Within the Sound of my Voice as the second single. I thought, and still think to this day, that Heartbeats Accelerating just wasn't a good choice for a single. I would've gone for Linda's own cowritten Winter Light as it was a good ballad. Arty didn't even begin to describe HA. I didn't even know it was Linda at first when I heard it on the radio until it got to the sections where her voice was more readily identifiable. But, I also thought there were several reasons Linda had trouble on the singles charts in the 90s. One was that she hadn't been a singles chart seller on a regular basis in the late 80s and 90s and I think she lost some fans along the way as a result. And I think her dismissive attitude to her pre-big band style recordings cost her some other fans as well. She came off sounding rather pretentious and ungrateful for the music that had brought her success. Linda gained new fans with the big band style recordings and the Spanish language but don't think those fans in either group cared for her pop-rock return. The big band crowd can be rather snobbish and dismissive yowards all other musical genres. I liked the big band era but not necessarily other fans of that genres. They reminded me a lot of certain Beatle fans who were dismissive and hateful towards other successful artist, especially ones with big sales. But, there were other things like Linda being in her 40s at the outset of the 90s and passing 50 during that decade. Radio stations and record companies truly were and are geared towards the younger performers with a prevailing attitude that past 40, it's time for the older performers to retire. Even though they may still be making music, even potential hit songs, radio stations and record companies don't want to promote those artists even though many baby boomers (and people born in the 70s) were still a big market and who still followed their favorite artists. The biggest movers of cd sales were not new artists but the reissues of older artists on their back catalog. That should've turned on a light in the heads of many record executives that there was still a market for older artists but it never happened that way. The record companies still treated older artists as washed up and unmarketable. |
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Post by erik on Mar 4, 2015 23:02:49 GMT -5
Quote by sliderocker:
That was part of the problem I had with her in the 1990s: her dismissive attitude (or what seemed to be a dismissive attitude) towards that music. Some people will disagree with that opinion, and possibly think that somehow I am a traitor or something, but I stand firmly behind that opinion. It made it progressively easier and easier for the public to forget who Linda was; and in the end, you can't blame this all on demographics, or record labels, or radio stations. Linda herself has to share some of the blame, and I make no apology for saying this.
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Post by Guest on Mar 4, 2015 23:28:52 GMT -5
Blame what? Linda has had one of the longest and most successful careers of any female vocalist singles or no singles. By the 1990's she had started a family and had long wanted to settle down and retire. Fans are lucky she made music at all after that and through bad health yet some will never be satisfied as they look at Linda's career through their own eyes and make assumptions. Today she appears to be perfectly happy with her choices and decisions in her long life and career. I don't think she laments those years, her success and neither should anyone else.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Mar 5, 2015 7:41:23 GMT -5
very good points guest and welcome. erik, we or at least I should say I and not include everyone since I didn't poll people, do not think of you as a traitor. I do not think she was as dismissive of her 70's past then in the 90's as she was still doing somewhat of that material including feels like home and we ran. I think much of it started after the Christmas album and the 2000's that she started to focus on the music heard in smaller venues for acoustic purposes etc. also saying I did my best singing after I was 50. I do think that she didn't have to talk about her heyday they way she did then but again I think that Linda does not fully understand the impact of some things she says (hey she is only human) and she sometimes does not remember how much she was into her music in the 70's. like we have discussed in the past, for linda, it is the process of creating music and experimenting that is her passion. she always has been dismissive of the final results no matter when it was in her career. eddiejinnj
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Post by jhar26 on Mar 5, 2015 11:03:47 GMT -5
Radio stations and record companies truly were and are geared towards the younger performers with a prevailing attitude that past 40, it's time for the older performers to retire. Even though they may still be making music, even potential hit songs, radio stations and record companies don't want to promote those artists even though many baby boomers (and people born in the 70s) were still a big market and who still followed their favorite artists. The biggest movers of cd sales were not new artists but the reissues of older artists on their back catalog. That should've turned on a light in the heads of many record executives that there was still a market for older artists but it never happened that way. The record companies still treated older artists as washed up and unmarketable. That attitude is also a major problem with classic rock radio stations imo. Their success proves that there is an audience out there, but do people really want to hear Jumpin' Jack Flash and Stairway to Heaven three or four times a day 365 days a year? Why not let us hear more variety, including what those people are doing today as well, and why not add some recent names who work in that same tradition to their playlists? |
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Post by fabtastique on Mar 5, 2015 11:59:37 GMT -5
Linda's drop in sales/popularity in the 90s was huge, and very undeserved - for me the quality of her music in the late 80s, 90s and early 2000s was the best of her career. I think you can really hear the love in her voice for the music she is singing.
I believe its been said by others on the forum (on other occasions) and I agree with this completely, that the fickle general masses, some so-called fans, and the publics unwillingness to accept or try the variety of music Linda was producing in the proceeding period turned people off her at an unprecedented rate. For me, I would never have listened to mexican music, Latin, lullabies, glass music, country and even perhaps the standards to the extent I do, without first being in love with Linda's voice and her taking me to them. I am incredibly grateful for her introducing me to this work and for her own outstanding contribution to these forms of music.
There are several instances on some of Linda's live bootleg recordings from 90s where, in the middle of a run of standards, she/we have to listen to some idiot shouting out "sing Heatwave!" or something else from 70s ..... not polite behaviour in my book!
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Post by PoP80 on Mar 5, 2015 12:48:55 GMT -5
Linda recorded the eclectic blend of music that she loved later in her career. There was no purposeful or hidden agenda about reinventing herself. I agree about broadening my exposure to different genres of music, which is always welcome and enriching. You can't please everyone all the time so the drop in popularity is understandable, and has happened with other artists who deviated from their established style.
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Post by linda on Mar 5, 2015 14:25:05 GMT -5
Blame what? Linda has had one of the longest and most successful careers of any female vocalist singles or no singles. By the 1990's she had started a family and had long wanted to settle down and retire. Fans are lucky she made music at all after that and through bad health yet some will never be satisfied as they look at Linda's career through their own eyes and make assumptions. Today she appears to be perfectly happy with her choices and decisions in her long life and career. I don't think she laments those years, her success and neither should anyone else. Well said. I think Linda is quite satisfied with her career and choices. |
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Post by erik on Mar 5, 2015 22:16:01 GMT -5
For the record, may I just say that I would never criticize Linda for wanting to have retired in the 90s to be a mom and raise her own family. I am 100% sure I have never done anything of the sort.
But I do stand firmly behind what I said about some of the statements Linda said in public during that decade about her music--that sometimes Linda didn't realize the perception that some of her statements in the press could have on her ability to get people to buy her records or to get radio to play them, apart from all the trends that might very well have contributed to the extreme downturn in her popularity in that period. You can't get people to like you or your music, or even retain your own fan base, by even merely appearing to be a snob, not even if you're Linda Ronstadt.
These aren't the kinds of criticisms made by any so-called "fair weather" fan (a phrase that I've always disliked), nor do I make them lightly, or just for the sake of stirring up trouble. I consider myself objective, not a walking-in-lockstep fanatic; and while that may not be popular with everybody here, that's not my problem. I am very comfortable doing it that way, even if the very thought of criticizing her on any point doesn't feel good for me.
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Post by fabtastique on Mar 6, 2015 2:27:42 GMT -5
Taking timeout to look after her family is admirable, as is recording what she wanted and not sticking to the same proven track record. It's a shame more people didn't follow her though but yes you can see that she is extremely happy and proud of her later work and providing she is financially secure (especially with her poor health) that's really all that matters  |
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Post by eddiejinnj on Mar 6, 2015 6:49:47 GMT -5
extreme downturn and other negative words, I don't really think fit IMO. I was happy she was on the charts at all and I enjoyed her music and the shows she was on in the 90's. she was doing adult contemporary/pop/rock in the 90's so much of her self-criticism of her earlier (not 60's) career really started in the 2000's. she had 3 Grammy nominations for the year 1999. she ended the decade well imo. eddiejinnj
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Post by linda on Mar 6, 2015 8:47:28 GMT -5
For the record, may I just say that I would never criticize Linda for wanting to have retired in the 90s to be a mom and raise her own family. I am 100% sure I have never done anything of the sort. But I do stand firmly behind what I said about some of the statements Linda said in public during that decade about her music--that sometimes Linda didn't realize the perception that some of her statements in the press could have on her ability to get people to buy her records or to get radio to play them, apart from all the trends that might very well have contributed to the extreme downturn in her popularity in that period. You can't get people to like you or your music, or even retain your own fan base, by even merely appearing to be a snob, not even if you're Linda Ronstadt. These aren't the kinds of criticisms made by any so-called "fair weather" fan (a phrase that I've always disliked), nor do I make them lightly, or just for the sake of stirring up trouble. I consider myself objective, not a walking-in-lockstep fanatic; and while that may not be popular with everybody here, that's not my problem. I am very comfortable doing it that way, even if the very thought of criticizing her on any point doesn't feel good for me. Erik- you are 100% right. In no way did I think you were being dismissive of Linda in your statements. Yes there was a time where she was "snippy" in her interaction with press. Who would blame her for hearing the same questions over and over. How many times can you be asked why you never got married ? ☺ |
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Post by erik on Mar 6, 2015 10:29:27 GMT -5
Quote by linda:
I readily concede that point about getting asked the same kinds of (very personal) questions time and time again--those are commonly known, by the way, as "Gotcha!" questions, the kind that are seemingly designed to provoke the kinds of responses they tend to provoke, and make the subject (Linda, for example) look bad. Unfortunately, the seemingly brain-dead public doesn't know that these are "Gotchia!" questions to begin with.
In the case of Linda in the 90s, whatever the reasons for the downturn of her popularity (and there are clearly many), I think there are three other things, besides Winter Light not doing as good as it should have, that still gall me to this day. One is the failure of the country music audience to embrace the release of "Walk On" from Feels Like Home when they had the chance back in 1995; after all, it was written by Matraca Berg, one of Nashville's great modern-day songwriters and an inveterate fan of Linda's. The second is that this same audience four years later wouldn't embrace "He Was Mine", a fairly straightforward country-rock track from Linda's and Emmy's duet album Western Wall. And the third one was the total, and totally undeserved, commercial failure of We Ran in 1998.
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Post by linda on Mar 6, 2015 11:40:56 GMT -5
Quote by linda: I readily concede that point about getting asked the same kinds of (very personal) questions time and time again--those are commonly known, by the way, as "Gotcha!" questions, the kind that are seemingly designed to provoke the kinds of responses they tend to provoke, and make the subject (Linda, for example) look bad. Unfortunately, the seemingly brain-dead public doesn't know that these are "Gotchia!" questions to begin with. In the case of Linda in the 90s, whatever the reasons for the downturn of her popularity (and there are clearly many), I think there are three other things, besides Winter Light not doing as good as it should have, that still gall me to this day. One is the failure of the country music audience to embrace the release of "Walk On" from Feels Like Home when they had the chance back in 1995; after all, it was written by Matraca Berg, one of Nashville's great modern-day songwriters and an inveterate fan of Linda's. The second is that this same audience four years later wouldn't embrace "He Was Mine", a fairly straightforward country-rock track from Linda's and Emmy's duet album Western Wall. And the third one was the total, and totally undeserved, commercial failure of We Ran in 1998. You are right about the "Gotcha" questions. They are probing, too personal questions that really shouldn't be asked in the first place and the person being asked is NEVER going to say the right answer. It's the old, "Have you stopped beating your wife" question. Yes or No, is going to get you in trouble. I agree with you regarding the downturn (I'm not sure that's the right word) in popularity. The more late 90's produced a lot of mediocre singers. Most of which I would be hard pressed to name because they never had the voice that Linda had. Although 1995 did give us Natalie Merchant with her album, Tigerlily. Great voice and wrote all of her own songs. I always felt she was so underrated. I have met Natalie and she is a really nice, down to earth person. Matraca Berg, great songwriter ! What can you say, fans are fickle and sadly expect entirely too much from singers, actors, writers.... I have thought that we sometimes feel an undo "ownership" of our favorite singers, Linda for example. In the realistic light, she is a single Mom who , more than likely gave up too much for "us". Think of it this way, if she were your sister would you want her life to be dictated by strangers and her every move be watched so closely? Certainly not. That's my thought. |
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Post by PoP80 on Mar 6, 2015 12:49:12 GMT -5
You make a salient point, Linda. I don't think anyone would want to be scrutinized in that way or to that extent.
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Post by erik on Mar 6, 2015 13:50:21 GMT -5
Quotes by linda:
Which is why I'd never ask such questions of her if I ever got up the nerve to interview her (of course, that would make for a "boring" interview in the eyes of a tabloid-obsessed public). The questions I would ask would be to do with her interaction within the Los Angeles country-rock scene of the late 1960s and early 1970s, and what, if any, connecting thread there is between the different styles she essayed in her career. I guess a hypothetical question I would ask of her would be whether she ever considered doing a full-on album that combined her country, rock, and Mexican music roots, with perhaps half the songs in Spanish, and half in English, mixing elements of the aforementioned styles.
I can't blame her for feeling the way she does about stardom and privacy, and the frequent clash of the two things she has had to deal with. At the same time, though, I would also say that she has been able to handle her stardom much better than a lot of other people we could name, in not letting it go to her head. It is true that she did give up a lot for the fans, and perhaps we did indeed want too much from her. I plead guilty on that part.
As for fans being fickle--I think this is true to a great extent, given how much people are influenced (or is it brainwashed?) by the mass media. To turn on the TV or the radio, you wouldn't think there's anything more out there than Meghan (All About That Bass) Trainor, or Iggy Azalea, or Ariana Grande as far as female singers are concerned. I would say, though, and Robert would certainly agree, that Linda's classic country-rock albums still make an impact even now, especially with what Tift Merritt has done, and, more recently, Caitlin Rose. The good stuff is out there (IMHO); one just has to be ambitious enough to want to find it.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Mar 6, 2015 17:41:53 GMT -5
the maniacs/merchant had some success mainly merchant's album tigerlily. her fame has faded and did not have near the amount of yrs in the limelight as linda. it JUST happens. allanah myles; one hit. shawn colvin was much older when she got some fame. If not for Lilith Fair, her time in the limelight would have been less. I believe shawn was on that tour. we kept pondering the 90's on about Linda. I think she gracefully and gradually reduced her limelight much of it by her own choice; some not. eddiejinnj
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Post by PoP80 on Mar 6, 2015 18:15:51 GMT -5
I love Shawn Colvin. I've been following her career since the 1980s when she was a backup singer in small folk clubs. She has that special something and I knew she would eventually make it as a solo act. I saw her recently with Steve Earle at City Winery and it was a great show.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Mar 6, 2015 19:19:05 GMT -5
My point is most music careers have ups and downs. Linda's went in what I believe is a natural continuum. You start out, you work hard, you refine your craft, you gain fame, in some cases as in Linda's you achieve superstar status then you have a gradual decline due to variopus reasons from starting a family, decline in ability which was not in Linda's case until her disease started to show symptoms, to being tired of the biz and road, etc. I saw Aerosmith, who had achieved star status with toys in the attic album, in 83 in a like 500 people club in nj (the fountain casino) steve tyler was no more than like 10 feet from me. they were having a lull in their career then. Then they went superstar status and have maintained the resurgence (Tyler being visible recently on idol and very loyal aerosmith fans). eddiejinnj
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Post by linda on Mar 6, 2015 19:44:16 GMT -5
My point is most music careers have ups and downs. Linda's went in what I believe is a natural continuum. You start out, you work hard, you refine your craft, you gain fame, in some cases as in Linda's you achieve superstar status then you have a gradual decline due to variopus reasons from starting a family, decline in ability which was not in Linda's case until her disease started to show symptoms, to being tired of the biz and road, etc. I saw Aerosmith, who had achieved star status with toys in the attic album, in 83 in a like 500 people club in nj (the fountain casino) steve tyler was no more than like 10 feet from me. they were having a lull in their career then. Then they went superstar status and have maintained the resurgence (Tyler being visible recently on idol and very loyal aerosmith fans). eddiejinnj I agree. I do think that Linda has had an interesting career. Young when she started her career. Had a good long ride but even today if you mention her name people equate it with the 70's to 80's Linda. Even though she did wonderful work after that time, many people associate that time period with her. I have never been able to figure that out. |
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