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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 15:56:08 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 I understand all of that Eddie.. I bought all of those albums/CD's I didn't mean to hold Linda's illness against her.. I was just making a contrast between her early albums verses the latter.. I was trying to understand why her albums didn't sell as much.. sheesh!
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 25, 2023 16:17:24 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. Thanks, Dianna! I did not coin that term and I'm sure you understand the context and what I'm referring to. Jeez...
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Post by RobGNYC on Jul 25, 2023 16:34:07 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. Don Lemon was fired from CNN in April two months after being suspended for saying that Nikki Haley "isn't in her prime" (Haley is 51). He also said that a woman is "considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and maybe 40s." My point is that any discussion of a woman's "prime" is inappropriate at best. I stand by my comment.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 16:47:44 GMT -5
I liked the "Hummin To Myself" photo a lot. Adieu False Heart should have had another cover. The one they used in what Japan (the pic of Linda and Ann) was a really nice pic. Again, mot much for dark sepia type tones. "AFH" is a very stark depressing album cover. eddiejinnj
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 16:54:56 GMT -5
I was just explaining the intent/effect of the "Winter Light" in case you didn't realize. Hey, I don't know everything. Sheesh is a term of disgust. Not sure why it was used. I didn't think you were holding Linda's illness against her. Didn't even come in to my realm of thought. I was expressing my opinion/knowledge of that time in Linda's career and why she opted not to have a quote traditional Linda album cover. I was stating things very innocently. I just had a second cardiac surgery and am living life as if each day is my last. That's all. I am in a good mood though in pain. eddiejinnj
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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 17:15:51 GMT -5
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. Don Lemon was fired from CNN in April two months after being suspended for saying that Nikki Haley "isn't in her prime" (Haley is 51). He also said that a woman is "considered to be in her prime in her 20s and 30s and maybe 40s." My point is that any discussion of a woman's "prime" is inappropriate at best. I stand by my comment. That's not the entire reason he was fired. (nice try tho)but I digress... this is NOT CNN and I'm not making 3 million dollars a year on this site...You don't have to be so nasty..Just ignore my posts.. as I will yours.
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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 17:35:27 GMT -5
Sheesh is a term of disgust. Not sure why it was used. I didn't think you were holding Linda's illness against her. Didn't even come in to my realm of thought. I was expressing my opinion/knowledge of that time in Linda's career and why she opted not to have a quote traditional Linda album cover. I was stating things very innocently. I just had a second cardiac surgery and am living life as if each day is my last. That's all. I am in a good mood though in pain. eddiejinnj Actually sheesh means surprised or annoyance..Mine being the latter.. But thanks for interpreting what I meant.. lol... I agree you should live your life stress free..and remind ourselves this is just a message board for fun.. and stop taking this so seriously.. Most of us have been on this board for years and at this point if you don't know who means well and who doesn't well then that's not my problem..
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 17:51:47 GMT -5
Yeah, there are different meanings but they are basically not positive (actually one of the meanings is disgust). The latter you stated is annoyance which I am not sure why? I very innocently made my contribution. The ending of your post is not positive either. Again, I have stated not sure why as to not misinterpret but I am just staying positive. I always state that the focus of this forum is for fun. I just want the forum nice truly. I am not taking this too seriously at all. You should know after all these years that I mean well, lol eddiejinnj
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Post by erik on Jul 25, 2023 18:28:00 GMT -5
If albums like Winter Light and We Ran didn't sell because the public didn't like the picture on the front, then that's truly an indication of how utterly shallow they had gotten to be by the 1990's.
And again, I don't buy the idea of ageism being a factor in how Linda's popularity fell through the floor in that decade, since so many of her generation either kept having success, or, in the case of the Eagles, got back together and found audiences very receptive to their music. Linda found very little of that, if any, during that time..
As for sexism--well, even that's a little bit of a climb, because of how Madonna kept going, as did Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey. So the sexism part I don't buy either. Sorry, but I don't.
I just think that whatever Linda wanted to do during the 1990's, she got to do of her own free will. But that didn't necessarily mean that the record-buying public, for whatever reasons one can come with, was going to buy her albums the way that she had seen happen even up to 1990; and judging by the very low record sales, especially for undoubtedly top-notch albums like Winter Light and We Ran, they indeed didn't. She had gotten away with being as eclectic as all-get-out in the 1980's; but she tried a lot of audience's patience in the 1990's, and they just responded with indifference. That may not be the analysis that people want to hear, but again, I don't do political correctness.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 25, 2023 18:55:19 GMT -5
Unfortunately, for Linda, I get your point, Erik. I guess numbers don't lie and her albums just didn't do what they once did sales-wise. At least us fans, still got to appreciate some top notch work done in the 90's!!! eddiejinnj
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Post by Dianna on Jul 25, 2023 18:55:21 GMT -5
Erik, it's probably a combination of many things and whether or not you agree with it T & A album covers SELL and do contribute to the success of an artist.. ESpecially for women.. Even Linda herself said (and I'm paraphrasing) YOu've got to be a babe in the business..(I forget the rest lol) I'm not sure why anybody would feel offended by that? It's the truth. I think by being politically correct you would dismiss all of that as if it didn't exist. I'm not saying I agree with it.. There's nothing wrong with being a beautiful woman and using it in the best possible way.. as Linda did.. Even Madonna doesn't sell as many records as she did in the 80's , 90's early 2000's.. nor has she had a hit record.
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 25, 2023 19:46:37 GMT -5
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.
It's definitely more complicated. I know Linda had some champions while she was still at Elektra/Asylum, but I don't know how many of her champions were in favor with the other powers that be at the label. When the label has gotten all the money they can get from you as an artist and they don't promote you as much as they used because they are focusing on that new kid in town Glenn was singing about, it should be time to start looking at other labels that might be happy to have you. Or so they claim, yet when I look at the other artists who label jumped, their fortunes didn't exactly increase and their album sales may have been a mixed bag of one or two successful versus the remainder all being flops.
Heart made the jump from Mushroom (an independent label) to Portrait (another CBS vanity label that was phased out in the early 80s) and then to Epic (another CBS), they had some successes but the album sales declined at an alarming rate. They would then jump to Capitol/EMI, have some success but then they would go through another down period in their career. It may have been about not having champions at their record companies initially but there was something else altogether that was a little more uglier.
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 definitely had to do with ageism on the one hand, but Linda endured the same things Elvis endured in the last four years of his life and that Ann Wilson also went through that caused a decline in the sales of Heart's albums. And it was the elephant in the room that no one wanted to talk about. And that was they had all gained weight. All three had problems with their weight which I think had plagued them from when they were all younger. Ann Wilson's weight ballooned when she was in her early 30s and it only seemed to increase. And her weight issue dated back to when she was in her teens. Elvis gained weight in his early 30s but he also lost the weight, thanks to exercise and medications he took to control his hunger. Unfortunately, his weight got the best of him, and his gaining and then losing weight and putting it back on and then losing it again, was one of the contributing causes to his death. Most believed his weight to have been around 250 pounds at the time of his death, but it was actually about 100 pounds over 250. He had gained too much weight in the last three months of his life and that caused him to have a widowmaker heart attack which killed him before he even hit the floor. Linda, I don't know much about her weight gain, other than it seemed to hit her when she was in her late 30s and early 40s. Same age as Elvis was, basically. Another thing the two seemed to have in common. But, record companies wanted their artists to look as though they were still 25, even when they are or were 55 or older. It's the worst kind of ageism but of course, how many artists still had record contracts when they were 55 (in recent times)?
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.
Again, I believe that at the time Linda was releasing albums of standards and albums sung in Spanish, she should've been recording songs for her regular pop-rock-country-country rock fan base. But, Linda was nothing if consistent about not caring what her fans wanted, that she was going to record what she wanted and if the fans bought it, great. But, if they didn't, she wasn't going to lose any sleep over it. Linda did a lot of damage to her career by not releasing regular albums alongside her specialty albums. Of course, maybe there is something to an artist or their management issuing competing albumsthat will affect the sales but in all honesty, I don't think Linda would've given a sh*t if her standard albums and Spanish language albums had sold 25,000 copies versus her pop-rock affairs selling 2.5 million. It was something she wanted to do as an artist. Maybe she would've been disappointed if her standards and Spanish records hadn't sold very well, but she needed to be on the pop-rock singles charts and she needed regular pop-rock albums on the charts.
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.
A friend of mine once said I would be a good manager if I ever decided to go into show business. He was a lead guitarist and had been in a few bands since high school. He wanted to put a band together and wanted me to manage. I wasn't sure about that as the others who would be in the band would also have to be agreeable. I also knew someone else who had the serious looks to be a successful actor and he wanted me to be his manager too. I think I missed my calling. Anyway, a good manager's job is not to kiss his or her client's a** - that's what their friends are for, but a manager's job is to give it to their client straight when their career has stalled and they need to try something else to restart their career.
You're not being disloyal to them when you tell them it's time to move on. An artist may not want to hear that from their fans, yet they should be willing to listen because it's the fans who plopped down the $20 or whatever they needed to but an artist's latest album. Linda's end career recordings sold about as well as her beginning solo career albums sold. And her solid efforts deserved to sell better than they did and I tend to blame the record company for not pushing her albums. And I think it was a case of ageism and the expectations of Linda's fans that Linda weigh about 110 pounds again.
Ann Wilson caught sh*t from the Heart band members (even from her own sister), the record company, radio executives and fans about her weight problem. I consider it a miracle Ann survived the flack she got from everyone about her weight being responsible for Heart's albums selling poorly. Linda's last standards album and her album with Ann Savoy were on specialty labels, so any expectation those albums would sell a million copies would've been out of line. Selling 50,000 copies or 100,000 copies would've been good but no one was going to say anything if the albums just sold 5,000 copies.
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 25, 2023 20:16:48 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.. With Winter Light, the album cover was not an especially good cover. I would've rejected it for being too bland and requested the art department to come up with something more tasteful. It was Linda and she deserved better than that cover! Feels Like Home, a favorite album of mine and I loved the cover but I consider the album's failure to have been the fault of the marketing and promotional department. Not pushing the album or the singles. Where you have no big hit singles, you have no hit albums. No one knew Linda had a new album available. Radio was barely playing her and good luck catching radio when they did. The songs were good but they were not LINDA RONSTADT! Linda, I think, lost her sense of pop direction, of what made for a good hit single. She was in the studio recording and producing herself largely, but she was relying on session players instead of an actual band behind her. Those playing behind her didn't gel together as Linda Ronstadt's band. When Andrew, Kenny, Dan Dugmore,Don Grolnick, Bread drummer Mike Botts or Rick Marotta, Waddy Wachtel, and the extra touring musicians who played behind Linda in the 70s, they gelled as a band. Those playing behind her in the 90s and early 2000s didn't truly gel in the same way. And Linda was a victim of ageism, being too old to be heart on the Top 40 radio stations. And MTV for that matter. But, Linda didn't take the alternate road less taken, finding other ways to promote your records when radio won't play you and MTV won't play you. MTV wouldn't play Carly Simon's Let the Rivers Run, so Carly bought airtine on NBC to air the video. And artists also discovered selling your albums via TV, bypassing so-so sales in the stores.They never found a way to promote singles but I always thought why not just use TV to do that too? I don't know if Linda ever considered setting up her own record company and selling her own CDs via mail order as well as in the stores. Sales wouldn't have been as large but once you have all the production and marketing kinks worked out, you could sell 100,000 copies or 5,000 copies and be happy because you didn't have any pressure or stress from the record companies about needing to sell 10 million copies.
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Post by sliderocker on Jul 25, 2023 20:30:50 GMT -5
I was just explaining the intent/effect of the "Winter Light" in case you didn't realize. Hey, I don't know everything. Sheesh is a term of disgust. Not sure why it was used. I didn't think you were holding Linda's illness against her. Didn't even come in to my realm of thought. I was expressing my opinion/knowledge of that time in Linda's career and why she opted not to have a quote traditional Linda album cover. I was stating things very innocently. I just had a second cardiac surgery and am living life as if each day is my last. That's all. I am in a good mood though in pain. eddiejinnj Wish you well and much good health, my friend. Hoping I won't need any further cardiac surgery in the near future myself. Living each day as if it were your last is a good way to live. I have a friend on Facebook, well, I guess she's off Facebook now, but she was dealing with bone cancer and was told earlier this month she's at stage 4 brain and bone cancer. And she's in long term hospice. That news just stunned me beyond belief. She has accepted what is to be and she is going to spend what time she has left with her family. That's a reminder to me that as bad as I think things can be on my health, someone else has it worse and would gladly trade places with you. I'm by no means 100%. Maybe 90%, but I don't pray for myself on my health but for those who have it worse and are going through worse. So, God be with you, Eddie. And with Linda as well.
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Post by Partridge on Jul 25, 2023 20:35:08 GMT -5
Linda's plummeting sales, in my opinion, were due to lack of airplay. She was considered old school and did not get the adds on pop radio.
It's a plausible theory that releasing two Spanish-language albums back to back after the multi-platinum success of Howl Like the Wind hurt the sales of Winter Light. I was not pleased. On the other hand, after releasing three duets as singles, the fourth single from Howl Like the Wind, one of Linda's best songs ever, Adios, had little airplay. I never heard it anywhere other than on the in-store music at Walgreen's. I think it made the Top 10 on the Adult Contemporary chart, which means squat. My point being that radio had abandoned her as a singles artist before the Spanish albums. Radio had Mariah Carey now-- they didn't want someone whose career originated in the 1960s.
Radio would not play Heartbeats Accelerating by Linda Ronstadt but they would play This Used to Be My Playground, a #1 by Madonna. Had Linda recorded that it would not have charted.
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Post by Holly on Jul 26, 2023 1:24:37 GMT -5
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Post by MokyWI on Jul 26, 2023 6:14:07 GMT -5
I liked the "Hummin To Myself" photo a lot. Adieu False Heart should have had another cover. The one they used in what Japan (the pic of Linda and Ann) was a really nice pic. Again, mot much for dark sepia type tones. "AFH" is a very stark depressing album cover. eddiejinnj I think the Adieu cover fits the album perfectly. It’s not a happy album, but it’s a great one. One of her best IMO.
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 26, 2023 8:01:24 GMT -5
I agree re: the music of "AFH". "King of Bohemia" is absolutely gorgeous and a masterpiece. Even on the cover, it is hard to read the words "Zozo Sisters". It should have been the photo of them on cover with a readable "Zozo Sisters" above it and the cover would have been a good back cover photo if anything. Slide, thank you so much for the well wishes. I truly appreciate it. eddiejinnj
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 26, 2023 8:05:01 GMT -5
Hi Holly: I would have thought Linda would have made the longevity list with the number of albums she had that charted. Thanks for posting that.
eddiejinnj
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Post by RobGNYC on Jul 26, 2023 8:45:49 GMT -5
I don't understand the list. Even allowing for differences between 2016 when he did the study and the latest Top 50 Greatest All-Time Artists (https://www.billboard.com/charts/greatest-of-all-time-artists/), where, for example is Diana Ross? She's in the current-list Top 50 both solo and with the Supremes, but not on the 2016 list at all? Something doesn't make sense. Linda is #67 on the current list.
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 26, 2023 11:31:22 GMT -5
I was just explaining the intent/effect of the "Winter Light" in case you didn't realize. Hey, I don't know everything. Sheesh is a term of disgust. Not sure why it was used. I didn't think you were holding Linda's illness against her. Didn't even come in to my realm of thought. I was expressing my opinion/knowledge of that time in Linda's career and why she opted not to have a quote traditional Linda album cover. I was stating things very innocently. I just had a second cardiac surgery and am living life as if each day is my last. That's all. I am in a good mood though in pain. eddiejinnj I'm so sorry to hear of your health issues, Eddie. I hope you're feeling better each day of your recovery. Let's remember that we all share a common interest in our love and appreciation of Linda and her music. Everyone's comments are valid and we should feel free to express our thoughts. It's not necessary to harp on every word, or take people to task. We all want the best for Linda, and nobody's comments appear "mean-spirited" from my perspective.
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Post by MokyWI on Jul 26, 2023 12:53:40 GMT -5
Eddie I am sorry to hear of your health issues, I hope you are recovering as quickly as possible. We are in that age now. How the hell did it come up on us this fast?!
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 26, 2023 15:20:27 GMT -5
Thank you all for your well wishes. It started with high bad cholesterol and then something came up a little off on a low dose lung x-ray. I, since quitting smoking 12 years ago (it was my main 10th anniversary gift to my mate) have been diligent in getting my lungs checked out. So in the ensuing months various tests were ordered for various reasons and my nuclear stress test came back slightly positive so that resulted in 2 stents in main 2 arteries leading to heart (one area each) so had to get two stents done one at a time recently and a bad pinched nerve in my neck. One day at a time!!! eddiejinnj
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Post by PoP80 on Jul 26, 2023 15:56:07 GMT -5
Yikes, Eddie! That's a lot to deal with at once. The main thing is that you're taking care of all these issues, and hopefully your health will improve going forward. You've been keeping up with the discussions, so I had no idea of your health challenges. Stay strong and rest up!!
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Post by eddiejinnj on Jul 27, 2023 9:26:00 GMT -5
Aw thanks, Pop. It is one thing I find really enjoyable keeping up and posting on the forum. I keep as busy as possible. Plus, we still dog-sitting for my step-mom who broke her knee on the plane down to Aruba. What a nightmare for her and her nieces who she went with. So now she in a NH rehabbing. Thanks again!!! eddiejinnj
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Post by musedeva on Jul 31, 2023 12:46:38 GMT -5
I think a real insight is Tony Bennett!! He said his real success in the "Biz".....wAS AFTER SIXTY YEARS OF AGE!!
so how'd he do that?
He stuck to a Niche....and Filled It!!
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Post by eddiejinnj on Aug 1, 2023 8:48:29 GMT -5
They basically created the category "Traditional Pop" for him. I think if they had that category when Linda did the NR albums she would have captured some. He stuck to his niche but also was smart enough to remain current by recording with younger artists, thus remaining more contemporary. Smart and it gave him new experiences artistically, imo. eddiejinnj
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Post by fabtastique on Jan 10, 2024 14:24:03 GMT -5
I wonder if work on this film has started ?
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Post by erik on Jan 10, 2024 15:32:39 GMT -5
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Post by laurenm57 on Jan 10, 2024 19:41:35 GMT -5
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