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Post by musedeva on Jul 17, 2023 20:44:30 GMT -5
Thank YOU so much for taking the time to say such sweet things....needed that...had to download.....still struggling to find replacement housing...TY!!!
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Post by Dianna on Jul 18, 2023 0:02:52 GMT -5
I'm so sorry for you loss Muse.. I can't imagine losing My Mother.. Your Mom sounds like a very sweet lady.. Xx00
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 19, 2023 10:23:27 GMT -5
If any of you have Apple TV, there is an interesting documentary about Selena Gomez called "My Mind & Me." It highlights her ongoing physical and mental heath challenges and demonstrates her vulnerability, honesty, and authenticity. I was impressed with her commitment to helping others, and the ways that she is coping with her own battles with anxiety and depression.
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 19, 2023 12:42:41 GMT -5
Some poetic license could take place, and the essence of Linda's life's story would still come through brilliantly, particularly if Selena dug in with her research and with her singing. But I can only think of a handful of things about Linda that could be cinematically dramatized and made interesting and still reflect the essence and the truth of Linda's upbringing, like being in Catholic school, which was something of a horror show for her.
Apologies, Erik, on missing your reply to my post. Since my cataract surgery, I see great on things that are far away but miss some things that are closer, even with bad reading glasses.
I believe some poetic licensing will take place, such as the horror show that was attending Catholic schools. I know what Linda reported on that she witnessed but I have to wonder if she personally experienced the abuse as well as being an observer? Those I knew who attended Catholic schools had nothing but horror stories of their abuse, though of the others I knew who attended a Catholic school and didn't get into any trouble were never traumatized by those who did get in trouble. Linda glossed over whether she experienced any of the abuse that went on at her Catholic school and the only mention of Linda getting into trouble at home was the Irish babysitter or maid who smacked Linda on her bottom when she wouldn't sit still when her hair was being brushed. No mention of getting into trouble with her parents in a similar way, though it wouldn't have been surprising if she had.
Other poetic turns could be Linda at the theater to see Elvis in Love Me Tender, although Linda these days seems revisionist in what she claims she listened to when she was young. Now, being Frank Sinatra and Sarah Vaughn. I'd hate to call her out on it with interviews from her younger dayswhen she said things like she listened to Elvis, Hank Williams and Kitty Wells. I couldn't see Linda as a Sinatra fan, not in the early days of rock and roll, not while saying she listened to Elvis and Buddy Holly and other rock artists. The first generation of rock fans had issues with Frank, mainly because he put down rock music and the performers. Sinatra was 41 in 1956 and he shouldn't have expected the teen crowd and younger listening to rock and roll to be his fans. Sometimes I wonder how much of what Linda says these days is jogged by comments from others and she doesn't remember everything because of her illness?
Her concert appearances, especially after the mass success of Heart Like A Wheel and when she appeared with her favorite in-house desperados The Eagles, could conceivably generate a lot of drama, but they would also show Linda to be the kind of "star" she must have internally thought she really was--someone who just did what she did, come Hell or high water, had a lot of success, and influenced generations of female singers well into the 21st century.
I think her superstar era and concerts and touring would make for a good back story of what it was like for her to be the only girl in a band with a bunch of men, and how her superstardom truly affected her as a very shy person. But, here again, I would like for it to be Linda as she lived it then, not some revisionist history on Linda's part where she's remembering her past differently to the way it happened.
There's enough interviews on Linda from the 70s and 80s and 90s on what her concerts were like and working with guys who didn't always like having a woman for a boss. I'd still like to know which band of hers it was where her male band members took control when it came to speaking with the audience instead of Linda? That would've been an instance of where I wished I could've been Linda's manager as I would've canceled that tour and that band, until Linda could've brought in a new band. That shouldn't have happened.
Same with the episode involving the executive from the Johnny Cash Show who somehow got into Linda's hotel room and got all naked thinking he would have sex with Linda. Linda's first manager refusing to do anything about it was very Parkerish. I would've had the guy arrested and made sure Johnny Cash and his people knew what happened, as well as having a restraining order against the executive. I think these two events would be good for the movie and to reveal how it affected Linda at the time and how she interacted with the people around her who worked for her who pulled that stuff. Just thinking about it makes me angry for Linda, even though it's been years and probably a faded memory of ghosts who are long gone.
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Post by Linda Fan 5 on Jul 19, 2023 17:20:29 GMT -5
The Elvis movie was very good because it had so much visual style. I expect that a Linda Ronstadt biopic will be similarly fast paced and dazzling I. Terms of the production value. That way you can stuff in to it all her genre hopping and mash it up into great entertainment that doesn’t feel disjointed or left turn after left turn. I believe that Selena Gomez can capture what I see as the essence of Linda Ronstadt. I return often to her quote “nobody had power over me” - meaning that she did what she wanted despite insecurities in certain areas. Linda is charismatic, forthright and brave and Selena Gomez seems to have a lot in common with her.
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Post by musedeva on Jul 19, 2023 19:29:10 GMT -5
I think where its going to be a "joint nail it on the wall" by Linda and Selena; is mirroring depression.....I think there was quite a bit of reference to depression by Linda in some early interviews that wasn't touched upon in later articles.....
...there's a lot to learn.....for wasting time....there's a Heart that Burns....there's an Open Mind
....never got the blues from whence I came, but in New York State, I got 'em.....
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Post by erik on Jul 20, 2023 8:32:25 GMT -5
Quote by Linda Fan 5:
I am not so sure about a Linda biopic being, or really needing to be, as fast-paced and dazzling as Elvis was, not because it can't be (because it can, in its own way), but because Linda was just so different an onstage performer from Elvis. Both of them could command the attention of audiences, but they each did things quite differently. Elvis just unleashed himself onstage, both when he broke onto the scene in the 1950's, and when he started touring again for real after 1969. Linda was very shy and seemingly tentative, until she opened her mouth to sing (then, as Don Henley says, "everything got different"). Elvis clearly had a much bigger voice than anyone gave him credit for when he was still breathing, and, when he had the right material (which was actually a great deal of the time, movie songs be damned), he more than did justice to that material. Linda was very similar in that way, though I suspect not many could necessarily have believed it at first given how petite she was. Her charisma, and it was hers alone, was to just go out there and do it, giving herself everything she got, however much she may have disliked the limitations of television, stadiums, and arenas; and she clearly succeeded, regardless of musical genre.
My analysis about this, based really on the 2019 documentary, is that the Linda biopic can be well-paced, and dazzling in its own way. It need not be Elvis to succeed, however.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 21, 2023 6:55:19 GMT -5
If done right, the film could really pick up on her many many artistic encounters with other artists, her personal milestones and reflect the enthusiasm of her fans. eddiejinnj
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Post by Dianna on Jul 21, 2023 18:40:23 GMT -5
In terms of The Linda Biopic, there will be a lot to discuss in anticipation. I'm wondering if they will cast Edward James Olmos as Gilbert Ronstadt as he always seems to be cast as the "fatherly latino dad." lol..
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 21, 2023 20:03:14 GMT -5
From what I remember of him that seems like a good casting for Linda's dad. eddiejinnj
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Post by musedeva on Jul 22, 2023 11:26:10 GMT -5
..................................Well, I think the entire Sinatra, Fitzgerald, and all the Torch era crooner references were to what her mom and dad, the beautiful Baritone, were actively listening to in the background of her homelife........i.e. overhearing it all..........nothing revisionist about that except maybe appreciating it moreso when she started learning those songs herself...SHOUT OUT to Tony Toni Tone King Bennett!! did she ever Du Et w/him?? R.I>P> .......poetic license could take place, .......Other poetic turns ........ Linda these days seems revisionist in what she claims she listened to when she was young. Now, being Frank Sinatra and Sarah Vaughn. I'd hate to call her out on it with interviews from her younger days when she said things like she listened to Elvis, Hank Williams and Kitty Wells. I couldn't see Linda as a Sinatra fan, not in the early days of rock and roll, not while saying she listened to Elvis and Buddy Holly and other rock artists. .
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 22, 2023 15:19:30 GMT -5
..................................Well, I think the entire Sinatra, Fitzgerald, and all the Torch era crooner references were to what her mom and dad, the beautiful Baritone, were actively listening to in the background of her homelife........i.e. overhearing it all..........nothing revisionist about that except maybe appreciating it moreso when she started learning those songs herself...SHOUT OUT to Tony Toni Tone King Bennett!! did she ever Du Et w/him?? R.I>P> .......poetic license could take place, .......Other poetic turns ........ Linda these days seems revisionist in what she claims she listened to when she was young. Now, being Frank Sinatra and Sarah Vaughn. I'd hate to call her out on it with interviews from her younger days when she said things like she listened to Elvis, Hank Williams and Kitty Wells. I couldn't see Linda as a Sinatra fan, not in the early days of rock and roll, not while saying she listened to Elvis and Buddy Holly and other rock artists. . I believe it's possible Linda values Sinatra and Fitzgerald and others because it was who her parents listened to, but I do think revisionism exists when you start denying all the artists and/or bands you listened to while growing up and who were part of who made you, you. As someone who grew up listening to multi generational performers, I never saw it as necessary to deny or slight your own generation of musical heroes in praising performers who you would discover later. Linda once claimed she never listened to Sinatra until she was living with J.D. Souther and that was when they were living together. Now, she says it was listening to Sinatra when her parents played his recordings. Can both stories be correct? In 1969, Linda cited Elvis, Hank Williams and Kitty Wells as her musical influences. A more mature Linda later said of Wells that she didn't hunger after a Wells record, that she and Emmylou were more refined. That, I thought was a revisionism, claiming she and Emmylou grew up in a different kind of environment and she wasn't the kind to listen to a Kitty Wells record. However, Linda and Emmylou may have grown up in similar kind of environments but they didn't grow up together so their environments wouldn't have been 100% exactly alike. Emmylou may have had the better musical upbringing, enough that Linda would drop who she might have grown up listening to and adopting Emmylou's musical tastes. But, I don't think Emmylou would've had anything against Kitty Wells. More recently, Linda said Elvis didn't grow as an artist but unless she listened to every recording he made, he recorded more than 700 songs in his lifetime, it wouldn't be possible for someone who only listened to a handful of recordings to conclude whether or not it was possible he grew as an artist. With her own recordings, Linda was regarded by most critics as a cover artist, just as Elvis had been regarded by many of those same critics as a cover artist. Did Elvis and Linda grow as artists, musically, despite their stock in trade being covers? Absolutely. As an artist, Elvis grew as an artist in ways Linda may not have realized, both as a vocalist and as an underappreciated musician. Linda dabbled in just as many musical genres as Elvis dabbled in. Musically, they were soul mates, though here again, Linda might not think so.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 23, 2023 4:46:34 GMT -5
I was thinking the same thing that her parents listened to Sinatra and Big Band stuff. So, it was obviously an influence to her. Maybe, she didn't listen to them on her own much back in her teens and 20's but later she acknowledged how important the influence was. She later discussed Andrew Gold, tmk, gave her Sinatra's "Only the Lonely".
eddiejiinj
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Post by erik on Jul 23, 2023 12:36:02 GMT -5
Quote by eddiejinnj:
Actually it was J.D. Souther who got her to listen to that particular Sinatra album.
Quote by sliderocker:
Even now, just under three years later, I still cannot wrap my head around how Linda could have been so obtuse in making that judgment call about Elvis not growing as an artist. Sinatra was at his best in the 20's/30's/40's Great American Songbook repertoire and show tunes; but when he stepped outside of that comfort zone, he just didn't measure up. Elvis may not have done the Great American Songbook (though he did do at least one entry from that songbook I can name, "You'll Never Walk Alone", from the 1945 Rogers & Hammerstein musical Carousel, in 1967), but he did consistently grow as an artist; and on his epochal 1969 album From Elvis In Memphis, he did explore the wide range of classic and contemporary C&W and R&B in his own way. Linda did a lot of the same thing, in her own way; and I kind of wish she had been more careful in what she had said, faulty memory or not (IMHO).
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 23, 2023 17:04:18 GMT -5
I was thinking the same thing that her parents listened to Sinatra and Big Band stuff. So, it was obviously an influence to her. Maybe, she didn't listen to them on her own much back in her teens and 20's but later she acknowledged how important the influence was. She later discussed Andrew Gold, tmk, gave her Sinatra's "Only the Lonely". eddiejiinj It's conceivable the artists Linda's parents listened to were never the artists Linda or her siblings listened to when they were in their pre-teens or younger, teens or part of their 20s, unless it was something done secretly. I still search through magazine stories and interviews, pre-1973, where Linda mentioned being a fan of the artists her parents listened to. There was one mention, I think it was in one of the old country music magazines circa 1969-1971, where she mentioned her family listening to Sinatra but no mention of her being a Sinatra fan. It's possible she was, but if she was, she downplayed it. I'm not sure why as I don't think Rolling Stone or Creem or any of the early rock periodicals would've slammed her for being a fan as they barely noticed her or covered her to any great detail during that time. Or took away any rock credentials she may have had. And I don't think it would've made a difference to any of Linda's peers as few would probably have seen that interview and as it were, they were all long out of school and grown up. And it would've been okay to have mentioned being fan.
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Post by Dianna on Jul 23, 2023 17:48:51 GMT -5
It's conceivable the artists Linda's parents listened to were never the artists Linda or her siblings listened to when they were in their pre-teens or younger, teens or part of their 20s, unless it was something done secretly. It's interesting you said that... When I was a kid, My Mom listened to A lot of Mexican Music, Javier Solis, Pedro Infante and even eydie gorme and los panchos.. along with Engelbert Humperdink, Tom Jones and Neil Diamond and Elvis.. We didn't have a choice.. all of that music played whether we wanted to hear it or not lol ..I did get my first big person stereo with a turntable and dust cover when I was 10 and along with my choice of 45's I would also play my mom's albums (in secret I guess) Eydie Gorme ( I think that was the only one) As i got older I appreciated the other stuff which I find myself looking those old songs up on youtube.. I haven't read the entire thread but didn't Linda get into Sinatra when she lived with J.D.?
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 23, 2023 22:23:46 GMT -5
It's conceivable the artists Linda's parents listened to were never the artists Linda or her siblings listened to when they were in their pre-teens or younger, teens or part of their 20s, unless it was something done secretly. It's interesting you said that... When I was a kid, My Mom listened to A lot of Mexican Music, Javier Solis, Pedro Infante and even eydie gorme and los panchos.. along with Engelbert Humperdink, Tom Jones and Neil Diamond and Elvis.. We didn't have a choice.. all of that music played whether we wanted to hear it or not lol ..I did get my first big person stereo with a turntable and dust cover when I was 10 and along with my choice of 45's I would also play my mom's albums (in secret I guess) Eydie Gorme ( I think that was the only one) As i got older I appreciated the other stuff which I find myself looking those old songs up on youtube.. I haven't read the entire thread but didn't Linda get into Sinatra when she lived with J.D.? It was J.D. who introduced Linda to Sinatra, and I think Linda would had to have been 26 or 27 years old at that time, going by the things Linda herself had said about the matter. First to Rolling Stone in the late 70s or early 80s and then to Downbeat (which Partridge rescanned and posted as another thread). Likewise, my parents listened to a lot of weird music when I was a kid that I wouldn't have been caught dead listening to as a kid.I started listening to some of that weird music when I got older but always in secret, on low volume where no one but me could hear or loud if I was the only one home and no one else was close by to hear it. (We lived in the country on a couple of occasions and the neighbors were a good 500 to 1000 feet away.) Regardless, I didn't throw away the records of the artists I had been listening to, then or now. There was no need for me to disavow any of the artists I listened to (Linda being one of those treasures I listened to) because I was listening to artists from other times, from the 1920s up to whatever the present time was. I didn't need to disavow my rock favorites because I was listening to classical, old American standards from the 1920s on up, country and anything else that piqued my interest. All of which leads me to wonder why did Linda feel she had to disavow the rock artists she listened to when was younger and her own material? When I started reading seeing or hearing Linda disavow her music or other artists, starting in the 80s, I thought she's getting a little pretentious about it and I didn't know if it was her doing the old American standards, the Pirates of Penzance on Broadway and the movie version, her Mexican recordings or if others around her were building up her ego to where being around her got to be an intolerable situation? But, with Linda's illness, I don't know how much of the past Linda is remembering accurately or inaccurately. Even when someone says something that jogs her memory, if she joins in the conversation, I hate to think the memory she may be relating is a false one. I seem to recall when Simple Dreams was reissued as a paperback or soft cover, something was said about the original print of the book had a story that actually hadn't happened, and it was subsequently deleted for future reprints of the book. And I know Linda still refers to herself as having Parkinson's, although Progressive Supranuclear Palsy is an offshoot but exactly the same illness. I wish Linda had someone around who has been part of her long journey and could point out a story as not being accurate. On the other hand, that would have to be embarrassing to Linda. And I don't think anyone who has been around Linda for a long time and loves her and cares for her would want to embarrass her in front of someone who might ridicule her or spread false rumors. Still, maybe John could ask to proofread any stories or interviews before publication so that there wouldn't be any gaffes on Linda's part?
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 23, 2023 23:05:07 GMT -5
Even now, just under three years later, I still cannot wrap my head around how Linda could have been so obtuse in making that judgment call about Elvis not growing as an artist. Sinatra was at his best in the 20's/30's/40's Great American Songbook repertoire and show tunes; but when he stepped outside of that comfort zone, he just didn't measure up. Elvis may not have done the Great American Songbook (though he did do at least one entry from that songbook I can name, "You'll Never Walk Alone", from the 1945 Rogers & Hammerstein musical Carousel, in 1967), but he did consistently grow as an artist; and on his epochal 1969 album From Elvis In Memphis, he did explore the wide range of classic and contemporary C&W and R&B in his own way. Linda did a lot of the same thing, in her own way; and I kind of wish she had been more careful in what she had said, faulty memory or not (IMHO).
It's difficult for me to wrap my head, but it may have been Linda's illness playing tricks on her memory. One thing I have always said about Sinatra (respectfully) was that when Elvis burst onto the scene in 1956, Sinatra was already 41 years old and his audience base wasn't Elvis's audience base. His crowd wasn't likely to listen to Elvis and Elvis's crowd wasn't likely to listen to Sinatra. It would've been naive for Sinatra to have assumed that he was going to corner the teen market and knock off Elvis. And that was the same for the rest of Sinatra's musical peers. It was difficult I think for Sinatra and company to look at Elvis's sales and not be green with envy at just how high his sales were. I don't know if Sinatra was jealous of Elvis's sales, but some of the barbs he lobbed at 1950s rock artists had to be borne of jealousy. The recently departed Tony Bennett opined in the 1950s that people wanted the kind of music he made and Sinatra made and the rest of their peers made, not the kind of music made by Elvis and his peers made.
Linda, being a part of rock's original fanbase, an Elvis fan and remembering how the rock and rollers were treated by the generations of artists above them, should've been enough of a slur and slap in the face against those rockers to have turned her off Sinatra for a long time. I was aware of the slurs and the slap in the faces of those rockers in the 60s, and I was the next generation down from the 50s rockers. And I didn't listen to Sinatra a lot because of it then. I would listen a little later on as I realized it was nothing more than jealousy and that Sinatra eventually wised up that his audience wasn't Elvis's audience anymore than the Beatles' audience wasn't his audience either.
His comfort zone really was songs from any era in which all he did was crooning. Mostly ballads but hardly demanding. I don't know if Sinatra ever sung anything in octaves but he never strayed far from the pop songs, but it's hard to believe Linda would claim Sinatra was the most influential artist of the 20th century. Even in the Downbeat interview, she said she didn't listen to Sinatra in the 60s, and that a boyfriend gave her a copy of Only the Lonely (not mentioned as Andrew) but she wasn't interested because it wasn't Dylan and then later on J.D. got her to listen to the record and other Sinatra records.
But, again, I believe Linda was revising her past beginning in the 80s and for good or bad, Linda's memory today may be her reinventing a past that suited her as she grew older and not what she actually experienced. It may also be possible the past she actually experienced she no longer remembers with clarity. And that would be a tragedy.
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Post by Dianna on Jul 24, 2023 0:16:55 GMT -5
All of which leads me to wonder why did Linda feel she had to disavow the rock artists she listened to when was younger and her own material? When I started reading seeing or hearing Linda disavow her music or other artists, starting in the 80s, I thought she's getting a little pretentious about it and I didn't know if it was her doing the old American standards, the Pirates of Penzance on Broadway and the movie version, her Mexican recordings or if others around her were building up her ego to where being around her got to be an intolerable situation? In general I don't recall Linda disavowing any rock and roll artists... Perhaps I missed it. IMO she always praises other artists and says "so and so is a much better singer than she is" or so and so is her favorite rock and roll band.. She said that about Tom Petty.. .... I wonder if what she is disavowing is her own approach to rock and roll music. She has always claimed to be a ballad singer. The Mexican Music and the Nelson Riddle stuff does seem to be her favorite .. maybe she felt more authentic or at home on stage performing those styles. I personally feel... The Mexican Music was her best along with The Country and Country Rock.. To be honest, I like when she sings the standards but I prefer Lady Ga Ga or K.D. Lang singing those styles a little better. It suits their voices more.. IMO
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Post by erik on Jul 24, 2023 8:49:57 GMT -5
Quote by Dianna:
I don't doubt any of what you said there Dianna, I would just like to add a few things.
As to Linda's claims of being a ballad singer--what I think makes her approach to ballads work without putting anyone to sleep with so many of them is that she invests all of her heart into them, with an emotional passion that is uniquely hers and not over-the-top. What her rock numbers seem to do is to is to show how she integrates and incorporates that kind of emotional passion evenly to satisfy both her own personal desires and that of her fan base, which is never an easy thing to do, and maybe something only she could ever accomplish.
And I have often said that the one kind of album that Linda never was able to make but one that I wish she had was to combine her country, rock, and Mexican influences all in one. In my mind, this would involve integrating woodwinds, some Mariachi brass, and Spanish guitars, twangy Telecaster electric guitar and pedal steel guitar, keyboards, synthesizers, drums, and bass. Some of the songs could be in Spanish, and others in English. I don't know if Linda would have ever considered such a project anything other than daft, but I think it would have been a way of connecting, or maybe reconnecting two of her biggest fan bases, Anglos and Hispanics, in a way that defied everyone's expectations, including Linda's own.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 24, 2023 9:08:32 GMT -5
I should have remembered it was JD not Andrew but I had the story line correct. It brought back that pre-age 11 influence that Linda speaks of sooooooooo frequently. Hey, as far as Elvis, Linda's judgement has had flaws over the years but I look at it as part of being human. eddiejinnj
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 24, 2023 13:13:04 GMT -5
I should have remembered it was JD not Andrew but I had the story line correct. It brought back that pre-age 11 influence that Linda speaks of sooooooooo frequently. Hey, as far as Elvis, Linda's judgement has had flaws over the years but I look at it as part of being human. eddiejinnj Yeah, Andrew wished he was a boyfriend, but that never materialized. Linda also said the Doors would be more successful without Jim Morrison. LOL.
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 24, 2023 18:13:41 GMT -5
All of which leads me to wonder why did Linda feel she had to disavow the rock artists she listened to when was younger and her own material? When I started reading seeing or hearing Linda disavow her music or other artists, starting in the 80s, I thought she's getting a little pretentious about it and I didn't know if it was her doing the old American standards, the Pirates of Penzance on Broadway and the movie version, her Mexican recordings or if others around her were building up her ego to where being around her got to be an intolerable situation? In general I don't recall Linda disavowing any rock and roll artists... Perhaps I missed it. IMO she always praises other artists and says "so and so is a much better singer than she is" or so and so is her favorite rock and roll band.. She said that about Tom Petty.. .... I wonder if what she is disavowing is her own approach to rock and roll music. She has always claimed to be a ballad singer. The Mexican Music and the Nelson Riddle stuff does seem to be her favorite .. maybe she felt more authentic or at home on stage performing those styles. I personally feel... The Mexican Music was her best along with The Country and Country Rock.. To be honest, I like when she sings the standards but I prefer Lady Ga Ga or K.D. Lang singing those styles a little better. It suits their voices more.. IMO I shouldn't have used disavowing as I was writing and then rewriting and then rewriting that too, trying to come up with what I meant. I didn't succeed. I meant to write she was disavowing her music and dismissing Elvis as an artist who didn't grow. Problem was it wasn't connecting up with what I was writing overall and that's where I got messed up. I would fire my in-head editor but he keeps mentioning that he's part and parcel of the package deal I made when I was born. Likewise, Linda scored big with me when she did all those standards but she never needed to be dismissive of her past recordings. If she had done the standards at the time when she was doing her first solo recordings, those recordings would've been in the cut-out bins in the record shops across the US. Standards was one of the lowest selling musical genres in the 60s and 70s, and I always believed the reason for that was you had so many artists from that era still covering those tunes. And you even had some new artists covering those tunes as well. Much as I loved the standards, it was a dead genre. And a younger version of Linda likely wouldn't have added anything to the genre then and she probably would've been criticized to no end by the critics who loved the standards and the fans who loved the standards. Linda's forte was country, rock and country rock and it's surprising Elektra/Asylum didn't request Linda also record a pop or rock album involving those genres during the time she was doing the standards and the Mexican language recordings.I would've asked her to have done that simply because I didn't agree with the record companies taking 2-3 years between an artist releasing an album and then making it five years and then finally 10 years at a minimum. That was nuts. That was why the record companies became dinosaurs. There was no reason for artists to take such long breaks between albums. Linda didn't actually take a long break between her albums. She stayed busy but I would've asked her to have done a pop-rock album after the album of standards, and then done another standards album after an album of pop-rock or country. She could've pulled it off because she was that good. When Linda's popularity took a down turn, I still believe to this day it was because she had no more champions at Elektra/Asylum the longer she was with them.Every record person in the record business wants to make a success out of someone new. And I don't believe Linda could've gone to any of the major labels and told the record people there she only wanted to sing the standards or the Mexican songs. She would've gotten the don't-call-us-we'll-call- you routine. That's why Linda's last recordings were on the Verve and Vanguard labels, both dealing in specialty recordings by the late 90s and early 2000s. It's surprising Linda or her manager just didn't set up her own record label for releasing her recordings, old and new. That's how some of Olivia Newton-John's last recordings were marketed. They carried no label imprint and I think she made deals with various companies to carry her CDs. I saw her CDs in drug stores and card stores and even in beauty shop stores. I had never seen beauty shops carry CDs in the line of work I was doing which included business in beauty shop stores. I don't know if Linda would've been willing to take that step.
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Post by erik on Jul 24, 2023 23:18:33 GMT -5
Quote by sliderocker:
I think it's more complicated than that. She did have people at Elektra when the 1990's started, including Bob Krasnow, who supported her; but by the end of that decade, all those people had left the label, and the new regime that took over were largely R&B people. They didn't seem to care or even notice that Linda even had a name or any prestige value.
And I think we have to acknowledge that, whether one thinks ageism factored into this sharp decline of her popularity in the 1990's in any way (I personally don't think that's entirely true, if it is indeed true at all), another reason for that decline is because her "eclecticmania" was not only alienating the 1990's pop music audience, which was going to be wildly different from the one of the 1980's anyway, but also alienating a sizeable porton of the fan base that she had had for decades. It's one thing for Spanish albums like Mas Canciones and Frenesi to sell as poorly as they did (especially in comparison to Canciones De Mi Padre), but to see Winter Light and We Ran so indifferently received by the public is something else entirely, because these were arguably two really great pop-rock albums that, at any other time, might have sold in the millions, but instead barely sold even in the tens of thousands. I remember one article in a newspaper at the time of the release of Feels Like Home in the spring of 1995 that read something along the lines of "Ronstadt's diversity may be her own worst enemy", or words to that effect. By the end of the 1990's, the general pop music audience didn't seem to know who she was any longer, or if they did, they just didn't seem to care.
It really hurts when I have to point these things out, because I know there may be other members on this board who think I am being shockingly disloyal to Linda. That is not true in any way, shape, or form. I really don't like to criticize Linda But I'm not going to do or say what is politically correct just to kiss a** either.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 12:23:50 GMT -5
I don't find you disloyal at all about stating the truth about "WL" and "WR". It might have started with "FLH" being properly categorized and marketed. Some say it was the release of 2 Spanish albums after "CLAR" though they were released very quickly near each other. "CLAR" success went into 1990 so "WL" being released in '93 was not that far away. By the 90's artists were releasing albums not nearly as frequently as in the 70's into the 80's.
eddiejinnj
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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 13:37:34 GMT -5
I'm wondering if some of the blame those albums didn't sell as much is because her album covers had become less interesting? Her face, IMO looked a little distorted on WL.. FLH was a computer generated image, which to me looked a little silly.. and We Ran, was very odd, IMO.. just her eyes? On a superficial level albums/ CD covers are designed to lure the consumer in... In her prime, Linda was the most gorgeous woman in pop music and her album covers reflected that. Erik and Slide seem to know a lot about the behind the scenes inner workings of a record company so I'm sure all of that takes into account..
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 25, 2023 14:37:23 GMT -5
I concur that some of the images were not the best on her later albums. But, let's face it...Linda was no longer in her "prime" when WL and FLH were released. It's a case of ageism regarding women and how they can be marketed. It's not a reflection of the song choices or her vocal abilities.
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Post by RobGNYC on Jul 25, 2023 15:02:25 GMT -5
What is “prime”? This thread is beginning to sound disturbingly like Don Lemon.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 15:27:23 GMT -5
Winter Light pic was seen through the rain that is the effect. "We Ran" she was very sick during that period. It is amazing how great the album is based on her overall health at the time. I played that album sooooo much when it first came out. I love it. eddiejinnj
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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 15:53:22 GMT -5
What is “prime”? This thread is beginning to sound disturbingly like Don Lemon. What does "Don Lemon," have to do with this conversation? I have no clue what you're talking about. It's also disturbing as a fan to give an honest opinion about my favorite singer on a message board I've been posting on for over 20 years without fear of a snarky retaliation. Dude, that was uncalled for. Just stop.
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