Peter Asher - Forrest Gump of Rock

[philly]

Crikey...I looked a helluva lot like Peter back in the 70s, except with dirty blond hair and bangs down to the top of my glasses

Hitmaker has been in the right place at the right time
Article by: JON BREAM , Star Tribune
Updated: January 14, 2012 - 6:52 PM

From the Beatles to Courtney Love, singer, producer and manager Peter Asher has had a remarkable career. He'll share anecdotes in shows this week.

James Taylor and Peter Asher in December 1969, likely the same photo shoot that produced the "Sweet Baby James" LP cover.

If Peter Asher were trying to condense his remarkable résumé, he could simply write: the Forrest Gump of rock.

Since the 1960s, he's been nearly everywhere.
•John Lennon and Paul McCartney played their just-penned "I Want to Hold Your Hand" for him on his parents' piano.
•He introduced Lennon to Yoko Ono and Mick Jagger to Marianne Faithful.
•He discovered, produced and managed James Taylor.
•He won the Grammy for producer of the year in 1977 (for records by Linda Ronstadt and Taylor) and in '89 (for Cher and 10,000 Maniacs).
•In the '90s and '00s, he produced albums by Neil Diamond, Randy Newman, Diana Ross and Morrissey, and managed Courtney Love and Clay Aiken.
•Oh, yeah, he also landed at No. 1 on the pop charts in 1964 with "World Without Love" as half of Peter and Gordon.

This week at the Dakota Jazz Club in Minneapolis, Asher, 67, will explore his career in song and conversation in a multimedia evening he calls "A Musical Memoir of the '60s and Beyond."

There's so much to cover, he probably won't talk about his current projects -- including a Buddy Holly tribute CD ("Listen to Me") featuring Stevie Nicks, Lyle Lovett and Cobra Starship (his daughter Victoria is the group's keyboardist).

His next album production features the husband-wife guitar duo Rodrigo y Gabriela. "Their records up until now have been just the two of them," he said. "This is a collection of their most popular tunes redone with Cuban musicians playing along."

From his Hollywood office, Asher shared some of his Gump moments.

On 'I Want to Hold Your Hand':

McCartney was dating Asher's sister, Jane, and staying at the Asher family home when the Beatles were in London.

"In some respects, it's quite ordinary when someone says 'You wanna hear a song?' and you sit down in a room in your own house," Asher said. "They sat side by side on the piano bench. There were no guitars. They played loud on the piano. Poor John sang loud; perhaps all of the German training, singing over raucous crowds and fights and cigarette smoke. They were really tough singers.

"There was something mysterious about hearing great art at the instance of its creation -- which sounds kind of pompous because it's only a pop song."

On getting 'World Without Love' from McCartney:

It was "an orphan song" that the Beatles weren't going to record. McCartney offered it to Billy J. Kramer, who declined, Asher said. "It wasn't finished. It didn't have a bridge. Weeks or months later, Peter and Gordon got a record deal from EMI. They were thinking of us as a little more folky. They said, 'If you have any songs you'd like to suggest, by all means.'"

So Asher asked McCartney about "World Without Love." He said yes to the duo doing the song but "we had to nag him a little bit so he wrote the bridge shortly before the recording session."

On having the Beatles as his boss when he was chief talent scout at Apple Records:

"They were very rarely unanimous but they were exciting bosses to have and they tended to allow each other a lot of room," said Asher, who met with them weekly to discuss Apple issues. "It was more like John would let Paul go ahead with his Mary Hopkin thing while John was off doing some crazy Yoko stuff.

"They were smilingly tolerant of each other's project until they weren't" -- a dispute over management of the Beatles, which led to their breakup. "John could be quite grumpy about stuff. Paul tended to be more diplomatic."

On the most lucrative recording he's worked on:

Probably "James Taylor's Greatest Hits." "That went on selling forever and forever," he said.

On Taylor's drug problems:

"I didn't really know much. I learned as I went along. I just thought he was exceptionally moody because he could be great and charming and funny. Finally, you learn all about junkies and whatever they say, you can't trust them. It was tricky but I didn't realize that [addiction] was why it was tricky. I just thought he spent a lot of time in the bathroom."

On which relationship led to better art: John & Yoko or Mick & Marianne:

"That's a hard comparison. Mick wrote 'As Tears Go By' after he met her at this party that I took her [and her husband] to. They wrote 'Sister Morphine' together and he wrote lots of songs about her. John and Yoko goes on until this day, in the sense that Yoko is still the carrier of the flame. There was lots of good songs there."

On who was more challenging to manage: Courtney Love or Pamela Anderson

Courtney, he said without hesitation. "Pam was challenging but in the relative scale of craziness and unpredictability, Courtney wins. I like them both. But Courtney could be really nuts. Pam is still a friend and a neighbor."
www.startribune.com/entertainment/music/137221078.html

[rick]

For anyone in or traveling to Northern California, Peter will be performing at the Rrazz Room at the Hotel Nikko in San Francisco from May 16 through May 20. --

www.therrazzroom.com/12ap/peter_a.html

[Dianna]

I just had to laugh at the title of this thread. thats all. lol

[sliderocker]

Interesting comments from Peter, though I wish the reporter had asked him about working with Linda. She was probably his most successful client, apart from James Taylor and there's nary a word about her???

[erik]

Quote by sliderocker:

Interesting comments from Peter, though I wish the reporter had asked him about working with Linda. She was probably his most successful client, apart from James Taylor and there's nary a word about her???

Peter probably wondered about that too; even though it's been twenty years since they last worked together, he has only ever said complimentary and gracious things about Linda in other interviews.

[sliderocker]

Jan 18, 2012 9:38:56 GMT -5 erik said:

Peter probably wondered about that too; even though it's been twenty years since they last worked together, he has only ever said complimentary and gracious things about Linda in other interviews.

I've always wondered, why did Linda and Peter stop working together? Did Peter retire as her producer and manager, because doesn't Linda have someone else who manages her now? If memory serves, think it's John Boylan, who, I think, managed her in the early 70s. I know Linda started producing herself (with the assistance of others) but it seemed like when Peter left, that's when Linda's sales started decreasing to some degree, even though Linda is an excellent producer.

[erik]

I suspect that Peter's reputation was such that he became a kind of A&R man at Sony during the 90s, and temporarily gave it a rest insofar as being a producer. The last time he had a credit on a full album of Linda's was on Frenesi, though some sporadic production credits showed up again on Winter Light and We Ran. I don't think it's because he and Linda had a massive parting of ways, like it's sometimes rumored to be. People change.

And while I think it is tempting to say that losing Peter as her producer resulted in the decline of album sales for Linda, I don't think that's really the case. I really think it was Linda not wanting to go back into straight pop music full-time after Cry Like A Rainstorm that caused it. Mas Canciones and Frenesi, the very first two albums Linda released in the 90s, bombed with both critics and (with the exception of the Latino market) audiences as well, even though they won Grammys; and consequently, all of her straight pop endeavors that followed barely registered on the pop music radar.

[bassreeves1]

"They were very rarely unanimous but they were exciting bosses to have and they tended to allow each other a lot of room," said Asher, who met with them weekly to discuss Apple issues. "It was more like John would let Paul go ahead with his Mary Hopkin thing while John was off doing some crazy Yoko stuff.

"They were smilingly tolerant of each other's project until they weren't" -- a dispute over management of the Beatles, which led to their breakup. "John could be quite grumpy about stuff. Paul tended to be more diplomatic."

Seems to fuel more " did Yoko break up the band" fire and create more questions than answers.

[philly]

Life After Gordon
June 13, 2012, 4:21 p.m. ET.
By JOANNE KAUFMAN
New York

Almost half a century ago, when Peter Asher and Gordon Waller were touring the U.S. as the mop-topped pop duo Peter and Gordon, they were eyed curiously one day by a young boy in a hotel elevator.

"You a Beatle?" he demanded.

No, Mr. Asher answered, they weren't in the Beatles.

"But you're a Beatle, right?" the child persisted. "You're part of that?"

"It was because we had the haircut," said Mr. Asher, who with Waller had a No. 1 hit in 1964, courtesy of the John Lennon/Paul McCartney composition "A World Without Love." "'Beatle' was almost a generic term. I think he meant 'are you part of the British invasion thing?' So I told him, 'Well, in a general way maybe we are.'"

Mr. Asher's part in the "British invasion thing" forms the basis of "A Musical Memoir of the 60s and Beyond," a multimedia one-man show—think magical history tour—that the (still) red-haired and (still) pixieish 67-year-old recently performed in Chicago, Minneapolis, San Francisco and Los Angeles. He opens a return engagement Tuesday at Feinstein's at the Loews Regency.

It will be readily apparent to audience members that the exuberant Mr. Asher knew anyone who rocked and everyone who mattered. In "A Musical Memoir," he tells of introducing John Lennon to Yoko Ono, and Mick Jagger to Marianne Faithfull. There are bits and pieces about the Beatles—his actress sister, Jane, dated Mr. McCartney, who for a time bunked at the Ashers' house on Wimpole Street. Young Peter first heard "I Wanna Hold Your Hand" when Lennon and Mr. McCartney banged it out in an early public airing on the Asher family piano. Wasn't that a time?

Still, Mr. Asher—who later headed up A & R at the Beatles' record company, Apple, then became a Grammy Award-winning producer—isn't one for taking a long soak in the past. "Part of the show is nostalgic, but it didn't grow out of nostalgia," he said.

The impetus was a 2005 reunion performance with Waller (the pair had amicably gone their separate ways 37 years earlier) as part of a benefit for Mike Smith, the injured lead singer of the Dave Clark Five. "We did six songs and we sounded OK. We still sounded like ourselves and people really liked it. They were crying and saying things like 'that's the song I proposed to my wife to,'" recalled Mr. Asher as he perched on a sofa in his midtown pied-à-terre.

"Having previously thought that two old fat guys getting together to sing their old songs was kind of pathetic, I thought it was respectable after all. So we decided to do more as the occasion arose. We did some full-length shows." These continued until Waller's death in 2009.

"What I discovered doing these gigs was that people were as interested in hearing the stories of those days as they were in hearing the songs," said Mr. Asher, who decided to assemble an act that would let him both sing old hits ("True Love Ways" and "Lady Godiva," among others) and schmooze about high old times with the Brit Pack: for instance, smoking weed with the Beatles in a theater's royal box—unaccountably, the queen was elsewhere—the first time he ever saw a Jimi Hendrix show.

"I remember looking around and thinking 'remember this!' I think I felt I was in the right place at the right time," he said. "Did I realize that the era as a whole was historically or culturally significant? No. I was just having fun and thinking that London was becoming central to something."

Mr. Asher, a boy soprano, met Waller at London's Westminster School. When the two were signed by the EMI label, there was front-office talk of perhaps making them Britain's answer to folkies like the Kingston Trio or Peter, Paul and Mary. "We would have been fine with that. But when 'A World Without Love' came our way, we were back to being pop singers," said Mr. Asher, who from the moment he first stepped into a studio was captivated by the process of creating a musical arrangement and playing with sound. "Once I figured out what a record producer was, I wanted to do it."

Even with all the names that get dropped, even with the climactic "A World Without Love" sing-a-long, Mr. Asher doesn't see "A Musical Memoir" as an easy sell. "If you just say it's the memoirs of a middle-level pop star from the '60s, it sounds deadly. It sounds really awful," he said.

"In terms of my name, the recognition is modest. The people who know about me from the '60s don't realize I went on to do a bunch of other stuff that had nothing to do with the Peter and Gordon era," continued Mr. Asher, who while at Apple signed and nurtured a then-unknown James Taylor and, at other labels, shepherded hugely successful albums for the likes of Linda Ronstadt, Neil Diamond, Diana Ross, Bonnie Raitt and Cher. Similarly, he added, "some people who know me as the person who produced all the James Taylor records don't realize I was half of Peter and Gordon."

Mr. Asher will, undoubtedly, have even more stories to tell now that he has co-written the love theme for the just-released animated adventure "Madagascar 3" and sung lead on the recording, something that almost never happened during his pop-star tenure. Cue the screaming girls.

Mr. Asher's schedule includes producing a CD of banjo tunes written and performed by Steve Martin and Edie Brickell; managing the Webb Sisters, an English folk-pop duo; and taking his show to Martha's Vineyard. "Write memoirs" appears nowhere on the calendar.

"I don't fancy a book," he said. "In terms of the Beatles era, everyone has written one. And they're all, you know, 'I was the fifth Beatle' kind of flavor. And they're all full of mistakes.

"I warn people before I start my show that it contains the usual degree of revisionism and self-aggrandizing and rewriting history that any self-respecting memoir would. But with a show I can keep adding and changing bits. And if somebody tells me that something I've said is wrong, I can say, 'Oh, sorry. I'll fix it.'"

Mr. McCartney has yet to turn up for a performance of "A Musical Memoir," but Ms. Ronstadt has seen it twice. Joan Collins showed up at Feinstein's last year and brought along Liza Minnelli. "That's when I thought, 'OK, this is really cabaret,' Mr. Asher said.

"I would find it weird if this show were all I were doing," he added. "It would be strange to have a career based only on what you were 50 years ago. I'm lucky enough that I'm still doing stuff."

[the Scribe]

What critics did Mas Canciones and Frenesi bomb with? Seems more like not much was said about them than they bombed which probably had more to do with the fact they were not intellectually capable of reviewing them or anything outside of their sphere.

[erik]

Quote by ronstadtfanaz:

What critics did Mas Canciones and Frenesi bomb with? Seems more like not much was said about them than they bombed which probably had more to do with the fact they were not intellectually capable of reviewing them or anything outside of their sphere.

www.ronstadt-linda.com/revmasc2.htm

www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/mas-canciones-19920206

www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,311704,00.html

These aren't the kind of reviews that made people break down doors to get those albums. And you can say whatever you want about the intellectual level of the people who write these reviews, or dismiss the people who read them, but please don't tell me those reviews didn't have an effect.

[Partridge]

This was a mostly positive review of Mas Canciones from
Entertainment Weekly:

www.ronstadt-linda.com/revmasc.htm

I think most critics were probably like me, and didn't know
enough about this music to write a proper review- that's
why so few reviews of these albums can be found.

Alanna Nash, who did the other review of Mas Canciones,
usually give very good reviews to Ronstadt's albums, so
she probably was giving her honest assessment.

[erik]

One thing I have always found fascinating, and somewhat amusing too, was the way Peter and Linda started their partnership, with him finishing up Don't Cry Now in 1973, and then becoming her manager and producer for the next seventeen-plus years. Here he is, a guy who first became prominent in America during the British Invasion of 1964, and now he's producing and managing a woman whose musical background is totally different from his--very early rock and roll, plus a huge amount of country-and-western, which he considered to be just "cowboy boots and yodeling." Linda, knowing this and realizing that he wasn't so far off the mark in his beliefs, gave him a lot of the pointers about all this stuff that was so alien to him. Clearly, it benefited both.

Linda still had to put up with a lot of s***, of course, from male chauvinist critics who said that she was being manipulated by this "Svengali" from across the Pond, which Peter always said was never the case. She was very determined to get things the way she wanted, and Peter was invariably supportive of her. In essence, there was probably no artist/producer relationship in either the Los Angeles music scene of the 1970s, or really the music scene in general, if we're talking about just one artist like Linda, that was ever this prominent or this successful. And I daresay, there probably will never be one like it, ever again.

[the Scribe]

Rolling Stone had to go to Daisann McLane who is a travel writer that appears to be trying to turn a clever phrase like so many actual music critics.

And EW proves that point about clever phrases:

She herself, alas, is tasty only when she sighs or whispers; the strain of singing loudly makes her voice go hard and flat. The album's title, Frenesi, means ''frenzy,'' but Ronstadt barely generates even the slightest heat.

compare that to reviews from real people whom the Frenesi review certainly had little effect:

www.amazon.com/Frenesi-Linda-Ronstadt/dp/B000002HBG/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_16

I would give Stereo Review more critical clout but their circulation is limited and I would wonder how many of Linda's fans actually read it.

Couldn't you find any good reviews or is this it?

I do think all three of these people/critics were outside of their sphere but I will give them kudos for trying just like they gave Linda kudos for trying but like their opinion of Linda's work on these albums my opinion of their reviews are not so great either.

I have seen reviews long after (like years) but maybe most of the reviews, especially good or the better ones are in Spanish. I can talk to any Mexican, from Mexico and they know Linda Ronstadt so I am thinking that is a bigger and more positive audience. Our friend Julian P. from Spain has sung the praises of Frenesi in its perfection yet the gringo critic from the North thinks otherwise. So he went to Harvard but I think he should have stuck with writing about UFO's than attempt to write about this kind of music. And like Julian, Placido Domingo sang the praises of Linda's Mariachi music. I think I would believe him more than most other critics but that's just me.

[Partridge]

Placido Domingo- the male Linda Ronstadt- technically perfect but
lacking passion and emotion, and might I add, lack of breath control.

Just kidding. I am practicing for my next career as a snarky critic.
I actually know nothing about Placido Domingo, other than Linda
was supposed to produce an album with him but if apparently fell through.

[erik]

Quote by ronstadtfanaz re. Frenesi:

Couldn't you find any good reviews or is this it?

I had a tough time just finding any reviews of it, period. It barely registered at all on anyone's radar, and most mainstream media outlets didn't even bother with it. They basically stopped taking Linda seriously as an artist at that point.

compare that to reviews from real people whom the Frenesi review certainly had little effect:

www.amazon.com/Frenesi-Linda-Ronstadt/dp/B000002HBG/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_16

I know all about those reviews, but that is a moot point as far as I'm concerned. Amazon didn't exist in '92, when it mattered, and so poor or no mainstream media reviews couldn't be countered with good online ones.

I'm not going to put any kind of spin on this or be politically correct: Frenesi bombed. Case Closed.

[MokyWI]

So did Winter Light, We Ran, and Hummin To Myself as well as Adieu False Heart, like those Frenesi is a FANTASTIC album. Sales don't measure quality and snarky want to be critics are bitter. I would take the word of someone who KNOWS the type of music over a Rolling Stone/People/Entertainment Tonight reviewer. All I know is when I put on Frensi for anyone and don't say who it is, ALWAYS it's praised and then when I say its Linda Ronstadt, some want to back track their praise.

[the Scribe]

I'm not going to put any kind of spin on this or be politically correct: Frenesi bombed.

Others would KILL to bomb like this:

The Grammy Award for Best Tropical Latin Album is an award presented at the Grammy Awards, a ceremony that was established in 1958 and originally called the Gramophone Awards, to recording artists for releasing albums in the tropical latin musicgenres. Honors in several categories are presented at the ceremony annually by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to "honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without regard to album sales or chart position".

Frenesí is a Grammy Award - winning album by American singer/songwriter/producer Linda Ronstadt released in 1992.

It was Ronstadt's third Spanish-language album. It reached number 193 on the Billboard Billboard album chart, #3 on the Top Latin Albums chart and #17 on the Tropic/Salsa chart. Three singles charted on the Hot Latin Tracks chart: "Frenesi" at number 5"Perfidia" at number 7 and "Entre Abismos" at number 33.

At the 35th Grammy Awards, Frenesí won the Grammy Award for Best Tropical Latin Album.

Mas Canciones (correct form: Más Canciones[1]; Spanish for "more songs") is an album by American singer/songwriter/producer Linda Ronstadt, released in late 1991.

Although it was a significant hit for a non-English language album, it peaked at number 88 on the Billboard album chart and sold approximately 400,000 copies in the United States. It also reached number 16 on the Top Latin Albums chart. The single "Gritenme Piedras del Campo" peaked at number 15 on the Hot Latin Tracks chart.

Mas Canciones won the 1993 Grammy Award for Grammy Award for Best Mexican/Mexican-American Album. In his Allmusic review, critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine called the album a "thoroughly enjoyable collection of Spanish and Mexican songs that is arguably stronger than its predecessor, since Ronstadt sounds more comfortable with the material than ever before."

This album has never been out of print.

Mostly 5 star reviews on Amazon also:

www.amazon.com/Mas-Canciones-Linda-Ronstadt/product-reviews/B000002H9Z/ref=cm_cr_pr_btm_link_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending

...when I put on Frensi for anyone and don't say who it is, ALWAYS it's praised and then when I say its Linda Ronstadt, some want to back track their praise.

Why is that?

[Partridge]

Why is that?

It's because thirty years of snide remarks by a small handful
of critics have been taken seriously by some. They can't
trust what they hear objectively-- they have to accept the
word of experts.

As far as the chart placings for those Latin albums, these were
all released before Latin music became somewhat mainstream.
And we consider any Linda Ronstadt album that does not
immediately go platinum to be a bomb.

I wish I had my emails from 15 years ago. A Cuban émigré
related to me a story that, to me, revealed the truth of the
Frenesi project.

[erik]

I stand by what I said.

If that troubles anybody, then I'll be more than happy to terminate my account right here and now.

[the Scribe]

It's because thirty years of snide remarks by a small handful
of critics have been taken seriously by some. They can't
trust what they hear objectively-- they have to accept the
word of experts.

The problem with all critics is they take themselves too seriously and think we should too. I know what I enjoy when I hear it and what I like when I see it. Unfortunately others need to be told what they should enjoy.

And to add: that is why it is important to have talented amateur critics (like Erik and others that contribute to Amazon) to set the record straight. It used to be we only got the varnished truth. Thanks to the internet that grip is less tight.

As far as the chart placings for those Latin albums, these were
all released before Latin music became somewhat mainstream.
And we consider any Linda Ronstadt album that does not
immediately go platinum to be a bomb.

And yes, I think "bomb" is a relative term. Linda's "bombs" would be successes for other aspiring and waning stars. From that aspect Erik was probably correct.


I wish I had my emails from 15 years ago. A Cuban émigré
related to me a story that, to me, revealed the truth of the
Frenesi project.

The Frenesi Project. Now that sounds like a name for a good book although I would be careful what I would believe from any over polarized Cuban source. That whole situation down there is bizarre and the players can be more so.

[Partridge]

I think I may have posted this before-

The Cuban fellow just told of how he heard some songs from
Frenesi on the radio in Miami. He didn't know who it was, but
he was sure she was the best Cuban singer he had ever heard.
When he found out it was Linda, he was shocked, because when
he was a teen back in Cuba in the '70s, she was his favorite
singer, even though her records were not allowed- he heard her
on the radio. This music was so different that he would never
have made the connection that it was the same Linda he listened
to twenty years before, because her phrasing and pronunciation
were perfect.

But he expressed himself more eloquently than my rehash here.

[Partridge]

If that troubles anybody, then I'll be more than happy to terminate my account right here and now.

I'm not troubled. A healthy difference of opinion is to be
expected. Otherwise, this would be the Linda Ronstadt Worship Center
instead of the Linda Ronstadt Forum.

[the Scribe]

Jun 18, 2012 23:58:30 GMT -5 Partridge said:

I think I may have posted this before-

The Cuban fellow just told of how he heard some songs from
Frenesi on the radio in Miami. He didn't know who it was, but
he was sure she was the best Cuban singer he had ever heard.
When he found out it was Linda, he was shocked, because when
he was a teen back in Cuba in the '70s, she was his favorite
singer, even though her records were not allowed- he heard her
on the radio. This music was so different that he would never
have made the connection that it was the same Linda he listened
to twenty years before, because her phrasing and pronunciation
were perfect.

But he expressed himself more eloquently than my rehash here.

Oh, that's a good story! I was thinking you were going to post something from a disgruntled Castro hating Cuban who was about to expose Frenesi as a pro-Castro plot to mess with the minds of native Cubans being as there was some heresay of Linda complimenting Castro at one point.

If that troubles anybody, then I'll be more than happy to terminate my account right here and now.


I'm not troubled. A healthy difference of opinion is to be
expected. Otherwise, this would be the Linda Ronstadt Worship Center
instead of the Linda Ronstadt Forum.

I do kind of like that idea about the Linda Ronstadt Worship Center! (which is pretty much my place of abode)

While Erik and I agree on 99.9% of just about everything we do find ourselves in a "Mexican Stand-off" at times. While Linda's musical detours may or may not have impacted what she had built up in her pop/rock fan base I think she absolutely had to take those excursions for her creativity, her sanity, timing issues and any other number of reasons we probably don't even know about.

We all know how close she was to her father Gilbert, how she adored him and his opinions, his love for Rancheras and his daughter. In a Hit Parader interview Linda had expressed circa 1969 about becoming a great Mexican singer while extolling the virtures of Lola Beltran. This was a long time coming. The Spanish recordings were gifts to her father, her family, her friends and a culture in which she was raised. It was a gift Gilbert was able to enjoy while he was alive. Similarly, Linda's detour into Gilbert & Sullivan was a nod to her Mom Ruthmary La Ronstadt. She unfortunately died during the filming of Pirates of Penzance but was quite alive during the Central Park series. She had to have been thrilled and proud of Linda for doing that.

As far as them being "bombs" depends upon one's perspective and what's important to the observer and Linda herself. I think all three of the Spanish albums were very important to Linda and needed to be done when they were, while she was in her top voice capacity.

Linda is quite perceptive and intuitive and has the keen ability and sense to listen to her "inner self." How terrible it would have been had these albums been recorded after her fathers death or the regrets she would have had for not doing them at all. Yeah, she probably spent some fan base capital but at that point in her life that really didn't matter. A similar case can be made for her detour into the Great American Songbook. She probably lost more of her old fans there as it was the first of her abrupt career turns.

While not huge sellers in the mainstream they were critically acclaimed by the Grammy association, some critics and many fans. I personally listen to Mas Canciones more than de mi Padre and to Frenesi more than both combined. It is such a wonderful album...bomb or no bomb.

[erik]

Quote by ronstadtfanaz:

While Erik and I agree on 99.9% of just about everything we do find ourselves in a "Mexican Stand-off" at times.

This is true. But don't get me wrong, it's not that I villify her in any way for exploring her ethnic roots. I did recently give a 4-star review of Canciones De Mi Padre over on Amazon back in early May. It's certainly far better than the one Rolling Stone gave it when it originally was released, in January 1988 (LOL).

My one regret with regards to Linda's Mexican exploration is that she never made an album that combined this aspect with the country and rock styles that made her popular. I know she feels that Spanish songs and English-language songs really don't fit, but I always felt it would be the kind of challenge she thrives on; and since her Mexican background informs several of her country-rock songs, it seems like a natural thing (IMHO).

[kiwifan]

[

www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/mas-canciones-19920206

That left no doubt of what the reviewer thought.

[the Scribe]

Oct 23, 2012 5:08:52 GMT -5 kiwifan said:

[

www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/mas-canciones-19920206

That left no doubt of what the reviewer thought.

Because Linda's voice is often so perfect these critics are at a loss to find anything they can to tear her music apart since they can't "get at" her voice. I have read similar type of amateur reviews blasting yet thanking her at the same time. Both amateur and professional critics then go on to say "if you want the REAL thing then listen to this or listen to that" (but not Linda). They don't get it. We are brought to Mariachi by and for her voice. It is the voice. The vocal acrobatics, the passion, the tenderness. We are in awe and don't care (or even know) how authentic it is. Most of us Gringos will never go on to listen to these so called "authentic" mariachi artists because it isn't about that music as much as it is about that voice. We marvel at what it can do. At times it seems to be its own entity that gets carried around by this cute, sexy, beautiful woman that allows it out to play at certain times and if we are lucky we get to hear it. It is at its richest and most complete when it can soar and Rancheras allow it to soar like it has never soared before EXCEPT on an occasional song from the Great American Songbook. So to all of you critics....paid or unpaid....GET OVER IT and GET OVER YOURSELVES!

[erik]

It should be said that, when Linda received the Trailblazer Award at the 2008 ALMA Awards, she acknowledged the risk that she was taking on by recording Canciones De Mi Padre, and how much both her label (Asylum) and Peter Asher himself were extremely reluctant to go forward with it. She still said that she was right to do what she did, but that both Peter and the Asylum execs were correct in their concern with whether it would sell. She didn't seem that way when Canciones originally came out (in some interviews back then, she seemed to come off as kind of cocky and a touch arrogant), so I suspect she developed a certain pragmatic reality in the ensuing years.

[the Scribe]

Oct 24, 2012 9:27:54 GMT -5 erik said:

It should be said that, when Linda received the Trailblazer Award at the 2008 ALMA Awards, she acknowledged the risk that she was taking on by recording Canciones De Mi Padre, and how much both her label (Asylum) and Peter Asher himself were extremely reluctant to go forward with it. She still said that she was right to do what she did, but that both Peter and the Asylum execs were correct in their concern with whether it would sell. She didn't seem that way when Canciones originally came out (in some interviews back then, she seemed to come off as kind of cocky and a touch arrogant), so I suspect she developed a certain pragmatic reality in the ensuing years.

Like I always say, "hindsight is 20/40."