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Post by erik on Oct 31, 2020 17:37:19 GMT -5
There was clearly a lot to unpack in this interview; and as has been the case, I was the one too chicken to do so first because of the reactions of some here when I have done so in the past.
Yes, I think the comment on Jim Morrison in THE SOUND OF MY VOICE (though she never mentions "The Lizard King" by actual name) was a bit much; the Doors were what they were in no small measure because of him, though given the way he behaved around some people, including Linda, I could see why she would feel the way she does about him.
But that slap against Elvis, that he was only good on Sun Records in 1954 and '55, and never as good thereafter, is absolutely f***ing totally off-base, and I have no hesitation in saying so. Yes, he made more than his share of mediocre movies and songs during the 1960s (chalk it up to the shyster he had for a manger); but I mean, come on!. Of all the people in the world, Linda really ought to know better than that! Part of her childhood revolved around the Man's epochal recordings on Sun and RCA, including, I might add, "Love Me Tender".
Conversely, many times I have made the case that not everything Linda did from the 1990s to the end of her career in 2009 necessarily matched up to what she had done during the apex of her career from 1974 to 1990, and I will stand by that.
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Post by Partridge on Oct 31, 2020 19:28:40 GMT -5
Yes, Erik. This is a discussion forum. We don't all have to agree with each other. And we don't always have to agree with Ms. Ronstadt. But everything Linda did from 1990 onward was great!
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Post by erik on Oct 31, 2020 20:08:52 GMT -5
Quote by Partridge:
To be fair, I did like all of Winter Light, all of We Ran, much of Western Wall, and (after an unbelievably long time) much of A Merry Little Christmas. I am still on the fence over Mas Canciones and Frenesi, but a lot less on their bad side than when they were originally released. And while not everyone liked what went down with "Dreams To Dream", I thought it was one of her best vocal performances.
However, I am immovable when it comes to "High Sierra" and "Lover's Return" (on either Feels Like Home or Trio II), and "We Will Rock You" (on Dedicated To The One I Love). Those were the low points, not only when it came to the 1990's, but of her entire career, in my honest opinion.
And as for Adieu False Heart, the last actual album of all-new material she did, with Ann Savoy: This was a brilliant collection of ultra-traditionalist folk and country (save for their cover of the 1966 Left Banke baroque-pop classic "Walk Away Renee", though that was a good track to have) that should have won the Traditional Folk Grammy for 2006 (unfortunately Bruce Springsteen's We Shall Overcome: The Seeger Sessions was the critics'/Grammy voters' favorite).
In all good honesty, there's a lot in that Goldmine interview that caused me to groan, that she would even say some of the hopped-up things she has said. I know it isn't, I guess, "politically correct" in the minds of some to criticize Linda for anything, but I would rather get hammered for telling the truth here, however upsetting it may be for some, than to be a blind a**-kisser.
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Post by sliderocker on Oct 31, 2020 23:21:35 GMT -5
Yes, I think the comment on Jim Morrison in THE SOUND OF MY VOICE (though she never mentions "The Lizard King" by actual name) was a bit much; the Doors were what they were in no small measure because of him, though given the way he behaved around some people, including Linda, I could see why she would feel the way she does about him.
Over the years, I have come to believe about Jim Morrison and his wildness and drunkeness was that it was all an image. It wasn't who he really was. And I look on it as having been a role he had to do to help put the Doors over as a band. However, being this wild, anti-establishment type person wasn't who he was, and I think that persona drove him crazy enough to drink and to take drugs. It seems odd that all the other members of the Doors came across as normal people, but Jim was the only one out there on that edge. The one taking the chances and the risks. It's not hard to believe he would die so early as a result. And I believe he wanted to be as normal as what the other Doors were, but maybe wasn't allowed to be.
But that slap against Elvis, that he was only good on Sun Records in 1954 and '55, and never as good thereafter, is absolutely f***ing totally off-base, and I have no hesitation in saying so. Yes, he made more than his share of mediocre movies and songs during the 1960s (chalk it up to the shyster he had for a manger); but I mean, come on!. Of all the people in the world, Linda really ought to know better than that! Part of her childhood revolved around the Man's epochal recordings on Sun and RCA, including, I might add, "Love Me Tender".
One thing I would remind Linda is that for someone who was never any good after they left Sun, his worldwide sales have been estimated at now being over two billion. Someone who was not that good wouldn't have sold in numbers not even a tenth or one percent. Elvis did something right. Further, Elvis knew he could sing and didn't need to hide behind an excuse that he became a better singer by singing old standards or Broadway tunes. Linda has an almost career long habit of putting down her own self as a singer as well as putting down her recordings. Elvis knew he had recorded songs he thought were garbage but he also knew not everything was bad.
Linda's comment strikes me as being very pretensive. It would be like saying Linda didn't do any good work after the Stone Poneys, which would not be true. I also have to wonder how much of Elvis's total catalog she was intimately familiar with? Did she know enough to speak from experience having listened to his catalog? Or did she stop listening past a certain point? Or worse, did she affect opinions based on others she hung around with and she is thus mouthing their opinions, which are not her own? Or wasn't until she hung around with others from the southern L.A. area?
For instance, having followed Linda from when she was 20 and I was 13, I never heard her express an appreciation for Frank Sinatra, Broadway songs or old standards in the early days of her career. She wanted to be a country singer, which she said in the last year or two was something she never considered herself to be. Her post-Stone Poneys recordings are a testament to the perjury of her later statement. And singing rock and roll certainly made her one of the wealthiest women in the music business. Country wasn't working out for her and I doubt she would've been successful if she had decided to switch from country to old standards and bypassing rock altogether.
I could picture Frank Zappa shaking his head in disbelief if Linda simply sung rock just to be a big success. I think Linda didn't really have a problem with singing rock or country but I think others around Linda may have influenced her in a way that was negative.
Each of us probably knows someone or maybe even our own selves, who kept their personal music choices to themselves when around their peers, the majority of whom may have been listening to someone we wasn't listening to. In my teens, I was already listening to some country and classical, as well as pop, soul and rock. I even listened to a little jazz for a time. One thing I knew about as a teen was to keep my mouth shut about artists or bands the majority of my peers were not listening to. I had to follow that dictum in my 20s. How stupid it was peer pressure stomped out a person's individuality in favor of going along with the crowd.
Of course, maybe Linda looks at it from the perspective she could've written songs but chose not to in favor of covering her favorite songs and the songs of her friends. Like Elvis, she has taken hits for not having recorded original songs and doing covers. However, I think Elvis had the potential to write songs, just like Linda but the reasons he didn't were different from hers. He wasn't given enough time to write songs. Red West near the end of his life said he believed Elvis was capable of writing songs, but he didn't have the time to develop it. Linda said she could but didn't want to add the world's list of bad songs.
But, as far as artistic merit, Elvis was not known for judging artists based on their work. Judging other artists is often perceived as jealousy. Elvis probably would've regarded Linda as a kindred musical spirit. I also have to wonder how Emmylou Harris would take Linda's comment about Elvis, as she appears to have been a fan, and still remains a fan?
Conversely, many times I have made the case that not everything Linda did from the 1990s to the end of her career in 2009 necessarily matched up to what she had done during the apex of her career from 1974 to 1990, and I will stand by that.
I'm much more harsh as I think not everything Linda did from the 80s onward stands up with her work in the 70s. My feelings for Linda, musically speaking, in the 80s were mixed at best. On the whole, I loved what she did but there were times when I thought she was being pretentious with it. Being a diva or being an artiste rather than an artist. The 80s was also where I saw a lot of people who had been Linda fans start to lose interest in her as a musical artist. And maybe even as a person. The music they wanted from Linda was what had made her a success but the contempt she had for the music and for her fans cost her in the long run.
And just as I believe Linda has never listened to all of Elvis's musical career, I wonder how she would feel if someone was as dismissive of her work based on what they don't know? And I've known people who were like that. And know people to this day who are like that. They know Linda for Different Drum or You're No Good or Blue Bayou, but that's the extent of their knowledge of her. If someone says she was nothing after any of those songs, is that a fair assessment? Of course not! But I think, sadly, Linda still has some of her old pretenses I saw in the late 70s and 80s. And I don't think they were really hers but the pretenses of musical friends she knew. And I think what they believed became what she believed because they were her peers. And she should've known better than that.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Nov 1, 2020 8:56:47 GMT -5
I think everything she has done, musically, is remarkable save for a few songs (probably 5 or less). My opinion is that her self-professed desire to be more gracious is something she would benefit from as a continued goal. My concern is moments like these, during a legacy phase of her career/life, and of course the, ad nauseum, self-deprecation issues paints her work with negative vibes. Also, the way the questions are worded is enticing her for her own personal evaluations of others. Though, how she responds is her decision. All have a great Sunday!!! Peace eddiejinnj
PS: Being subjective and protective, I, also, feel because of her first-hand experiences with Morrison that I can't blame her.
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Post by sliderocker on Nov 1, 2020 12:53:10 GMT -5
I think everything she has done, musically, is remarkable save for a few songs (probably 5 or less). My opinion is that her self-professed desire to be more gracious is something she would benefit from as a continued goal.
I couldn't have remained a fan of Linda's if I didn't like everything or almost everything she has done. And it's the same for Elvis, the Beatles and any artist or band I have followed and loved. That said, every now and then, they all had some songs that didn't work for me. Even Elvis's movie soundtrack songs weren't truly that bad, but the backstory as to why some were bad provides the reason they were.
My concern is moments like these, during a legacy phase of her career/life, and of course the, ad nauseum, self-deprecation issues paints her work with negative vibes. Also, the way the questions are worded is enticing her for her own personal evaluations of others. Though, how she responds is her decision. All have a great Sunday!!! Peace eddiejinnj
About Linda's Goldmine interview may be a case of what wasn't said or more importantly, what was left out. Magazine interviews are notorious for not being word for word on what the subject said exactly. Also, it can't be ruled out Linda's progressive supranuclear palsy continues to affect her memory. It may be some memories are only partial while others are totally gone. I think that could be why Linda said in an interview from the recent past she never considered herself a country singer. She may not remember her early solo albums were country and even during the mid-70s, many of her songs retained a countryish feel to them.
PS: Being subjective and protective, I, also, feel because of her first-hand experiences with Morrison that I can't blame her.
One can't really, but I also remember she also saw his other side. That when he wasn't drunk and mean, she said he was the sweetest person one knew. So, she saw two sides of Morrison but again, Morrison is long dead and maybe he knew he had a problem with alcohol and isn't here to say why that was.
I remember it was said he had stated his parents were dead, but they outlived him and there was an interview with Jim's father on Youtube. He gave a different impression of his son, that there wasn't really a divide between them. His father seemed to have been proud of him. And one thing I also remember from when Morrison died was that he had gone to Paris because he was tired and weary of his image and the Doors, and just wanted to get some peace from that. He only planned on staying in Paris for about a year but sadly, the peace he got was permanent.
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Post by Partridge on Nov 1, 2020 16:54:35 GMT -5
Even Elvis's movie soundtrack songs weren't truly that bad, The first Elvis music I remember being exposed to was my mom's copy of the soundtrack to King Creole. Even as a child, I thought it was dreck compared to other albums she had by Rick Nelson and Fats Domino and Patsy Cline. So as a kid, I was a much bigger fan of Ricky Nelson.
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Post by sliderocker on Nov 1, 2020 23:13:45 GMT -5
Even Elvis's movie soundtrack songs weren't truly that bad, The first Elvis music I remember being exposed to was my mom's copy of the soundtrack to King Creole. Even as a child, I thought it was dreck compared to other albums she had by Rick Nelson and Fats Domino and Patsy Cline. So as a kid, I was a much bigger fan of Ricky Nelson. The King Creole soundtrack wasn't the greatest nor was it the best introduction to Elvis's music. It wasn't total dreck but neither was it 100% solid. You've got to remember much of Elvis's movie soundtrack songs were sometimes written by songwriters like Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman, Don Robertson, Otis Blackwell and others - people who had written several hits for him. Leiber and Stoller happened to write a number of the King Creole songs, and their rock credentials are solid. You mention liking Rick Nelson. Do you know the above named songwriters also wrote for Rick? As did some of the other songwriters who worked for Elvis. Elvis's manager Col. Parker chased away the good songwriters Elvis had working for him, all because Parker wanted every bit of money he could take from them. I don't blame them for leaving. Elvis told Parker point blank in the 50s to stop taking money that was due them from their royalties and to stop adding his name as a co-writer. Parker stopped adding Elvis's name as a writer but he never stopped trying to take from the songwriters, even after Elvis' publishing companies more or less ceased operations. The songwriters who stayed on working for Elvis were actually no slouches when it came to writing good songs. However, Parker was taking everything from them as well. Most of the songwriters used melodies which were in the public domain as their melodies. If Parker was going to steal their royalties, the least they could do was to give him as little as possible. Songwriters using the melody of a tune in the public domain received a royalty which was 1/20th of a cent. And I don't blame the songwriters one bit for doing that. Some songwriters such as Ben Weisman and the songwriting team of Bill Giant, Bernie Baum and Florence Kaye wrote songs for Elvis which were a mix of good and bad. They did so because their songs were likely to be possible singles and likely to have radio airplay, from which they would earn more money. Weisman wrote a number of songs with different partners for Elvis, which were the A-side of singles during the 60s. The Giant-Baum-Kaye team penned the song (You're the) Devil In Disguise and also a powerful blues song on Elvis's From Elvis In Memphis, Power Of My Love. They also penned what was perhaps the strangest song in Elvis catalog, the European flavored-borderline psychedelic Edge Of Reality, which was a movie song. A good movie song. My point with regard to the movie soundtrack songs is the songs weren't all bad. Many were bad, but like the songwriters themselves said, when it came to writing songs for Elvis's movies, quality wasn't the first consideration. Because Parker had committed Elvis to doing four or five movies per year, they needed anywhere from 40 to 72 songs for possible consideration. And the songwriters were all working on spec, in competition with several songwriting individuals and songwriting teams. Yes, many of the songs were dreck, but what we heard, if we heard them was the best of the lot. We didn't hear the real dreck Elvis heard. Elvis had three piles for the demos he heard: Yes, No and Maybe. The No's he threw away. The Maybe's he came back to if he didn't have enough songs for an album. Maybe. Most of the time, they met the same fate as the No's. Elvis knew he wasn't getting good songs and once asked one of the people from Hill and Range, who oversaw his publishing, "What can you do with a piece of sh*t like this?" And my point was also if you've heard all of the movie soundtrack songs, you know they weren't all bad. In the 60s, a lot of tunes on the albums were considered filler, ten to fourteen songs anchored by the hit singles with everything else just something needed for the album. Sometimes there were a few good songs but a lot of times, the songs on the albums were just junk or garbage. I don't consider the first Stone Poneys album to be an especially great album, save for Kenny Edward's song Back Home and the song Orion. The rest of the album was wooden and plodding along. I think it's easy to see why Capitol considered Linda the girl with the goods but not Kenny and Bobby. If you lived in the 1960s, grew up with the music, as I did, you know there was a lot of dreck or filler with albums. It came with the territory and wasn't all that great. Even some of Rick Nelson had albums filled with filler. It didn't diminish him, nor does criticism of the Stone Poneys or Linda's solo work or Elvis's work diminish them in some way. They would be the first to agree with you not everything they did was a work of art. Some of it was just a piece of sh*t, just like Elvis said about some of his songs.
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Post by erik on Nov 2, 2020 10:24:42 GMT -5
Quote by sliderocker:
Very true, and the thing about filler and/or dreck on albums seems even truer in this day and age in one particular genre in particular: Country.
In the case of what Elvis did throughout most of the 1960's, the movie soundtrack songs were mostly ten or so songs designed to fit around the movie's plot, which was almost always the same for most of them, and which was a big reason why Elvis had such a low opinion of them. I agree with sliderocker that the writers really can't shoulder all the blame for what went down, if they indeed had to shoulder any of the blame. As it is, a lot of what the King put out as singles, even if they weren't necessarily as big on the charts as what he did in the late 1950s, was of high quality, including "Viva Las Vegas" (arguably his best "movie" song of the decade) and the Gospel ballad "Crying In The Chapel".
The same applies to Linda; her "batting percentage", when it comes to her music, is pretty much on par with the King's. And that's why I feel like I do about her comments. Not only is the constant deprecating of her own music, and this recent slap against a man who clearly influenced her approach in a number of ways, more than a little frustrating, in the long run it probably doesn't help with promoting either the film or the socio-political ideals she's trying to get across in it (IMHO).
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Post by LindaFan5 on Nov 2, 2020 21:50:35 GMT -5
I love the documentary Linda and the Mockingbirds. It’s a gorgeous movie that zeroes in on what makes Ronstadt so special. Her incredible singing voice anchors this film, no one else ever sounded so perfectly resonant, dramatic and thoughtful. It really is part two of “The Sound of My Voice” and should be watched that way by everyone. She is having a moment in the culture right now where she is appreciated as a superstar of a human, her amazing singing talent representing only part of it. How wonderful she is choked me up as I watched this movie. These recent movies and honors cement her in to a place where she always deserved to be, a rare, true original. A legend, a brave and original thinker and an absolute sweetheart.
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Post by fabtastique on Nov 8, 2020 0:42:11 GMT -5
Anyone outside the US found this available to stream or buy?
Despite assurances it will be coming to UK I’ve still not found it anywhere
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Post by Audiophile Guest on Nov 8, 2020 14:28:01 GMT -5
it begins streaming 9n HBOmax and HBOlatin November 16th. "A brave and original thinker" indeed.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 17, 2020 9:13:06 GMT -5
I saw it last night on Showtime. Of course, I would have liked more, but it was worth watching. The scene on the bus where Linda wished she could sing was very sad.
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Post by Partridge on Nov 18, 2020 1:39:24 GMT -5
I saw it tonight on HBO Max. Short. Only 41 minutes.
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Post by erik on Nov 19, 2020 9:37:18 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Nov 19, 2020 9:50:13 GMT -5
Eclecticmania - classic Linda!..
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Post by fabtastique on Nov 19, 2020 15:09:43 GMT -5
Such a great word and very appropriate !
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Post by rick on Nov 20, 2020 23:49:11 GMT -5
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Post by ausfan2 on Nov 27, 2020 7:41:45 GMT -5
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Post by ausfan2 on Nov 27, 2020 18:34:07 GMT -5
The full interview
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Post by erik on Nov 28, 2020 18:59:02 GMT -5
It really sounds like, from that interview, that she is managing to survive the COVID-19 crisis very well, though she obviously has big fish to fry when it comes to the cultural situation on the border that is the subject of the film.
I'm glad Dave Lawrence did ask her about her appearances at the Crater Festival, including the first one she did, which was actually in 1970, not 1969 or '71. And if memory serves me, it was that 1970 Hawaii appearance where her then-manager Herb Cohen got her and her band unintentionally tossed in a Bay Area jail for a few hours because the tickets they got were, in John Boylan's words, hotter than a two-dollar pistol.
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Post by Deleted on May 2, 2021 10:09:19 GMT -5
How much actual Linda is in this; in person, speech?
TSOMV had little contemporary Linda & should have been a 2- parter perhaps, or longer. I was informed & entertained, but felt a bit deprived, same for her book. Linda's interview for TSOMV was made while filming LATMB, given to Keach as he promised to film 'MB & made the trip.
Linda is building her legacy & maybe some mythology, so its all got to be solid, but she is the keystone.
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Post by erik on May 2, 2021 13:50:41 GMT -5
Linda, as she is now, is in a lot of LINDA AND THE MOCKINGBIRDS, but it largely centers around her involvement with the students of Los Centzontles; so rightly or wrongly, she makes the film as much about them as it is about her and her ethnic background. This is not a woman who was ever in the business of being a loud self-aggrandizing carnival barker, not even at the height of her career at the end of the 1970's.
I understand people's disappointment about both the memoir and THE SOUND OF MY VOICE that she didn't discuss more aspects of herself, including the pivotal 1976-1980 period when her popularity had reached its apex, or what happened to her after 1990 or so. About the 1976-1980 part being largely left out of the book, I sympathize with the disappointment--though she let it be known that she didn't like having to adjust what she sang or recorded on her albums for that time based on what was suitable for arenas and stadiums; and however one feels about that personally, I don't think you can blame her for feeling that way.
And as for the Parkinson's diagnosis (later re-diagnosed as the more sinister Progressive Supranuclear Palsy)--I think both the book and the film made clear that she didn't want it to be about the condition that robbed her of the ability to do what she had done for her entire life. She long ago came to the conclusion that there wasn't anything she could do about it. As she says in the film: "It is not a question of life after death; it's life before death. So how are you going to live it?".
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Post by rick on Jul 1, 2021 21:07:50 GMT -5
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Post by erik on Jul 1, 2021 21:45:07 GMT -5
Quote by rick:
I saw this too. I hope it gets a somewhat wider release, especially in L.A., Phoenix, and Linda's hometown of Tucson. Her Mexican-American heritage and her appreciation of the indigenous music of Los Centzontles are to be savored (IMHO).
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Post by Deleted on Jul 2, 2021 3:10:56 GMT -5
Los Centzoles have their own Youtube channel now.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 2, 2021 7:44:07 GMT -5
Wasn't it Linda's grandfather that was born in the Mexican town they went to? They say it was her father. Thanks much for the updates, all!!!!! Have a Happy Safe Weekend!!!!! eddiejinnj
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Post by erik on Jul 2, 2021 8:24:35 GMT -5
Quote by eddiejinnj:
I think it was her grandfather who was born there in Banamichi; her great-grandfather emigrated to Mexico from Germany during the 19th century, if I remember the chronology right.
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Post by rick on Feb 22, 2022 7:22:37 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Feb 22, 2022 8:35:09 GMT -5
WRT the Goldmine interview & Linda's harsh opinions there & before, I think the crankiness & grumpiness that often comes with middle age and senior years, makes opinions more barbed, critical and cutting, sometimes for mischief or more negative reasons.
Linda's remarks I think need taking with a pinch of salt. I don't doubt that her opinions expressed are insincere, but they may have changed over time, and her health, experiences and outlook will be affecting her perceptions to different degrees.
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