Offhand, I can think of three unmentioned Spinners hits without consulting the internet: "I'll Be Around," "Could It Be I'm Falling In Love," and "One of a Kind (Love Affair)." And I forgot about the Motown-era hit "It's a Shame."
The Temptations were finished as a crossover act when the Spinners came on - none of their post-Norman Whitfield stuff made a dent on the pop charts. Really, Motown was a shell of itself after 1972 when Berry Gordy moved the company to Los Angeles to focus on making Diana Ross a movie star. The Funk Brothers stayed behind in Detroit. So did the Four Tops and Gladys Knight & the Pips, who subsequently had some of their biggest hits - "Ain't No Woman (Like the One I've Got)" and "Midnight Train to Georgia," respectively - for other labels. Stevie Wonder was huge, obviously, as were the Commodores and Marvin Gaye. But the hit factory was dead and the other acts increasingly stuck to the R&B charts.
I wouldn't call the Spinners an unfamiliar act to white audiences and even dismissing them as a minor soul/R&B act seems a bit unfair. Then again, I can readily name all three Temps lead singers (David Ruffin, Eddie Kendricks, and Dennis Edwards), but this is the first I've heard of Mr. Wynne. I see that he died in 1984, the same year as two other soul legends who joined the "nightshift" too early: Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson.
I think "second-tier" is better than "minor", the same way that, for example, Boston was a second-tier rock group. No shortage of hits, but no long-term staying power.
The Funk Brothers didn't stay behind. They were left behind. They showed up to the studio to find a note on the door saying that Motown had moved to LA. This was after Gordy hired private detectives to find out if any of the Brothers were getting side work at other studios (they were).
Yeah, actually I didn't totally hate it. It's an odd choice for him to cover, but I think the song kinda suits his voice. Which is completely shot.
Can't say the same for the rest of his new covers album. Him trying to do shouty soul songs with his weak-ass vocals is embarrassing. And he needs to dump the producer that made everything sound like a K-Tel rerecording. Where's the E Street Band?
I miss singing that's not processed into synth sounds, bands with four-strong horn sections, and precise execution in the studio or in live performance.
People would still eat up this sort of music today but the labels will never greenlight it because it's too difficult and expensive to make.
I watched The Song Remains the Same the other day for the first time ever, and was totally blown away by their timing and execution while obviously on tremendous amounts of drugs and alcohol. I'm sure there was plenty of remastering and there are some obvious dubbing artifacts throughout, but today, that would involve basically a huge on stage production of prearranged music and lip synching. It was all about the music, not the personal lives of the bands, or the amazing production values or wardrobe or whatever (despite Jimmy's dragon suit)--all of that seemed to come later.
Many of the later Zep shows were absolutely shambolic, as were the studio sessions, because Pagey and Bonzo couldn't stay sober for ten minutes. Apparently "Presence" is dammed close to being a Plant/Jones duo record. They would work normal hours and leave tracks for Jimmy and Bonham to work with in the event either of them actually came into the studio.
"but the labels will never greenlight it because it's too difficult and expensive to make."
I think they need better talent than we have today, and they would need a lot less "engineering and producing". I have seen many live performances from the so called classic rock era that most entertainers could not match today. Without Auto Tune and Pro Tools many of the current generation would go nowhere.
Another aspect to it: the days of selling three million CDs at a retail price of $12.99 in 1987 dollars, or cassettes for $8.99 in 1982 dollars, or vinyl for $7.99 in 1977 dollars. are long gone. Something I just read, that lines up well with what I've read elsewhere, based on mechanical performance royalties:
"Justin Bieber’s song, Love Yourself, was written by Ed Sheeran, Benjamin Levin, and Bieber. It was released by Def Jam record label. The song has been streamed 17.4 million times. With the $0.091 per stream mechanical royalty, it should generate about $1,583,400. The streaming platforms will pay the whole sum to Def Jam as the label. Def Jam will then distribute the whole sum to everyone involved in making the song according to their roles."
Now compare that to Britney Spears selling 10 million cassette and CD singles of "Baby One More Time", which put perhaps $12-15 million in the pockets of the label. In 1998. So thirty million bucks or more in today's money.
All the people who run the business still need to make outrageous sums so they have extracted the difference out of studio time, touring support, studio musicians and producers, and all the remaining apparatus of the biz.
Most of today's hits are done via ProTools in a small studio. The expense is a fraction of what you paid in the Steely Dan days. And if you use electronic instruments you can do the whole song with vocal tracks and a MIDI pad.
I get what you're saying Jack, but I think there are other aspects to it as well.
For one, in the past there were fewer "musical pyramids" and they were much larger. Meaning, the music was "grouped" into fewer "categories", and each category was huge. So, if you could get into any particular category, you could really clean up.
The other part is the *real* reason "why digital ruined everything." Before digital, *talented* people had to hone their skills before they would be heard by anyone who could make them part of the business. There was no way to fake the talent. You also had to have the presence, and in pre-social-media age, everything was in-person, so people learned how to put on a show (say, the Beatles' Munich years). And the people who run the business then got to skim off the top of that talent pool. Today, because anyone can produce a song, or an album, it is much more difficult to separate the signal from the noise, and there is A LOT of noise.
I like how Tim Rice put it when he was a guest on Top Gear: "In the past, if you got to make a record, a lot of people had to have heard AND liked your music. Today, if you make a CD, it means *you* like it."
Not only that, but how many of the "yuts" today even fully appreciate in-person experience? I mean, why bother, when you can watch someone else's brief social media video of the event? You know, the one that starts with the shot of the person making the video, maybe their outfit, their friends, the "craaazy" show setup (like, totally), a few seconds of the main act, and then closes with yet another shot of the person making the video.
On a mostly unrelated note: my neighbors occasionally enjoy 16-18 hour parties that go until 04:00. And to my aging ears, through the mostly concrete walls, it all sounds the same, almost as if they're playing the same tune the entire time. Are my ears deceiving me, or has the sound really become that homogenized?
Everything is cheaper, disposable, and less appreciated. For all the things we've been instructed to feel entitled to quality has been carefully left out.
This is a very interesting topic. I know virtually noting about the business of producing music but as a listener the product that the business is giving us is worse than it was before the internet, and the use of computers and software to construct music. Is there anyone doing it the "old way" these days?
Part of the difficulty and expense is finding that talent. It's out there today. I've heard singers in local bars and even church gigs that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. But it takes a lot more effort to find those people than to look at someone's Instagram and see immediately that they'll look right in the video and on the album cover, secure in the knowledge that you can AutoTune and time-shift their voice into submission.
I completely agree. When I was a kid my grandmother, sometimes accompanied by my dad, would sing in church and it would always be a packed house. Looking back I am amazed at how good they were having no formal training. Much better than most of what we have today. The raw talent is still out there.
"If you want to be a writer ... all that really matters is the craft and what you produce. ... Whether it is seen by seven people or seven billion people."
Man, I hope this is true. My first four novels were published by one of the NYC biggies. When I lost that ride, I self-published a couple of books. I suppose a hundred people read each one. Most recently, I took a decent (but not strong enough) book that I didn't feel like revising again and simply asked my Facebook friends if they wanted me to email them a Word file. More than seven people read it. But not a LOT more than seven.
Melville died broke and with his reputation as a serviceable writer of travel tales torn into tatters by an unlovable disappointment of a book about the whaling business.
Celebrate, brother. You are one of the extremely small number of people who not only wrote four books, but had them published. By definition, that puts you amongst the most successful writers of all time. Be proud. You've done something amazing. And yes, I'm being dead serious.
My first book has yet to be finished, let alone published. In my youth, I was told often that I was a great writer, as I skated and half assed my way through school and university by producing work that said nothing of any true value or offered any great insights, but said it well enough that I could earn myself a degree. I spent the last decades squandering my gifts on corporate BS where I again struggled mightily to say nothing at all, while giving all the appearance of saying something. Of late, as I've actually wanted to start writing something of value at least to me, it feels like my muse has abandoned me. All my thoughts seem to come out in email size pieces now. I've even considered taking journalism courses, if only to have someone to call me on my BS and get me back on the writing path again. But the state of modern journalism makes me wonder if I'd end up any better off.
So what kind of books do you write? Where should I start exploring your work?
You are a gentleman and a scholar! My books with Minotaur/St. Martin's were a mystery series; the first one, and the one that sold best, is titled Purgatory Chasm. Whatever you do, don't take journalism classes. Complete waste of time (says this longtime journo). Just set an achievable word goal for each day (suggestion: 350, because it's not intimidating but it's more than a page) and don't get out of the chair until you've hit the mark. Take weekends off. In eight or nine months, you'll have a draft.
I get what you are saying about Journalism schools. I'm still of the generation where we thought that there should be a teacher/mentor out there somewhere who would share their knowledge and experience, and help us hone our craft. However, it seems those days are mostly behind us.
Was shopping for your book, and just wanted to ask if a paper, kindle or audiobook version benefited you the most. I'd prefer to support you if I can, because as Luca Brazzi said, "After-all , we are not communists."
It seems that the paper copies are not easily available in Canaduh. Is there a better place to order from then Amazon?
I must very humbly apologize to my fellow denizens of ACF. When I wrote Luca Brazzi above, that was in error. As any real man would know, of course I meant Emilio Barzini.
You raised a point that I'd been mulling over of late. I was a kid in the mid 70s, when the American Graffiti/ Happy Days thing was all the rage. As it all happened before I was born, it could have been set 100 years in the past for as much as I could relate to it. Looking back now, it's weird to imagine that those movies and shows were nostalgic for something that only happened 10 or 12 years earlier. By current standards, that would be a show taking place in 2010. And while I do feel some nostalgia for the days before the world of the woke, I can't imagine many times in history when the youth of an era pined so openly for something that only happened a decade earlier. But then again, it does seem that boomers have never been willing or able to grow up.
and it was just like the teen scene in '52, believe me! tail end of korea subbing for 'nam. seriously if they'd said '52 instead of '62 you'd just have to change a few of the cars for it to work! i was there--a bit in l.a. even!
I think most Boomers were too young in the 1950s to have had genuine nostalgia for the era. I guess it's a bit like Fiddler on the Roof. American Jews of my parents' generation had nostalgia for the shtetls of their grandparents that they personally never experienced.
Whenever I look at vintage Sun stuff on eBay, I notice that all the computers on offer have the memory stripped out, along with any hard drive sleds, and all the other stuff needed to make a functioning system. Keyboard/mouse? Fuggeddaboutit.
Basically all there is are the case, power supply, and motherboard. It would take more than the asking price to get it working again.
I'm active in the audio hobby, and have watched the top of the 1970s vintage receivers go from a couple of hundred bucks 15 years ago, to $7-10k now. There is dramatically better quality gear available now, for dramatically less money. New, let alone used. But nostalgia hits hard.
I wonder what the Fisher FM-100-B tuner is worth that my late uncle gave me when he went solid state. I wouldn't mind an old Empire 598 or 698 turntable, built like tanks, they go for four figures. When I was in college they were getting closed out and a friend bought one for like Pioneer money.
Modern Class D amps are quite impressive, particularly for the money. For about $10 you can buy a 100WPC fully functional power amp module with a Texas Instruments class D chip (power output is dependent on what kind of laptop power supply you're using, you're not going to get 100 watts out of a 24V 3A supply). My home stereo has a Adcom 555 200WPC amp, with a Reference Line passive preamp. Stuff that's at least 20 years old. Unless I spend some real serious money, with ears that are almost 68 years old I doubt either modern or vintage equipment is going to sound any better to me than what I have. When I was in NYC a few years ago, I heard a system with McIntosh electronics and Focal speakers at Alex Roy's audio salon that was revelatory, but I think the system cost something like $40k.
The 50s nostalgia definitely got its start in the 70s, but I always thought it hit its stride in the 80s (see, e.g., Back to the Future) and wound down by the early 90s (see, e.g., The Sandlot) just in time for 60s nostalgia to kick in (see, e.g. Forest Gump). The 60s nostalgia is 100% no doubt boomer driven. I always attributed 50s nostalgia to the late-silents and some of the early boomers, the difference between which may be hard to perceive in some aspects. Regardless, it seems like there’s an approximately 30 year nostalgia cycle at least in the post war period. However, I don’t think it’s been quite as strong in the past decade or so.
When I was in elementary/middle school in the 70s and we had a 50s dress up day, because Happy Days, there was a definite difference in styles. Maybe I'm out of touch but I don't see where there would be much of a difference wearing George W Bush era clothing.
For better or worse, a good portion of my closet would agree with you.
I think a good illustration of the point is the first scene in Back to the Future where Marty is in downtown Hill Valley. The extent to which his reactions drive home how different things are is really interesting. I once argued that there was more of a difference between 55 and 85 than there was between 85 and 15, and, other than certain aspects of smart phones and the internet, I think the statement is largely true.
In '55 the state of the art in fighter planes was the F-86 and F-104. By 85, those airframes had been long since replaced in the USAF inventory, and our primary jets were the F-16 and F-15 with a dwindling number of F-4s holding on. We still fly and produce the 16 and the 15, which are now 50-ish year old designs. Hell, we just ordered some more F-15s.
I own a 50s automobile, and my first car was a mid-80s automobile. There are worlds of difference between the two. Not so much between my 87 and any other car I've had subsequent.
Between 1955 and 1985 we went from no home video to it being common place. The primary difference since then has been an increase in access and resolution.
Computers are a little different. The differences between 55 and 85 and 85 and 15 are probably equally significant. However, the idea of someone using a computer for daily tasks or having one in a home was far from unheard of by 85. Moreover, the rate of obsolescence in computing, especially for laptops and desktops, has certainly slowed in the past 10-15 years. I still get frequent use out of a 12 year old desktop, and most people would likely be fine with a similar vintage system for most common computer tasks today.
None of this even gets into culture. However, I think it's fair to say that the changes that made the difference so shocking for Marty and that we continue to see today went through their most significant transition between 55 and 85. Everything since then has been the proverbial slippery slope.
Surprising subject matter today and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I certainly had no idea of this backstory, even as someone who includes "Games People Play" pretty often in my karaoke selections. Now: time to go dial up that live performance....
Knowing PRACTICALLY nothing about R&B, there are a couple of things you describe here that stick out in order of importance:
That ability to convey a set of emotions utterly convincingly (whether personally experienced by the artist or not) is real artistic TALENT. period, No matter the genre or medium.
That description of the audience during those times makes me wish that was the case with the broader ethnic community today.
Played it three or four times today on Spotify, your analysis is spot on Jack. I’m a bit embarrassed that I’ve never heard of the song previously, given my age.
"to standards that were well below “Steely Dan” but also not Springsteen’s “Nebraska”."
I probably ought to be embarrassed that I know _exactly_ what you mean by this, but I find solace knowing that you are just as big a nerd as I am when it comes to this sort of thing.
And with regard to this: "Mighty Love, however, was no Use Your Illusion," you're saying The Spinners' second album was not bloated, self-indulgent, and in need of editing?
Growing up in the 70's in the Phila "tri-state-area", Gamble and Huff's Philly International sound was the sound of my youth. Wonderful groups mixed by the recently deceased Joe Tarsia of Sigma Sound with one heck of a group of sessions players. The Spinners, O’Jays, the Stylistics, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Teddy Prendergast, Delfonics, Billy Paul, the Intruders, Lou Rawls, MFSB. The best!
Definitely remember the spinners. I don't know if that's because I grew up in NY, but they were on the radio and played at parties back when I was in school.
Apropos of nothing, we need an article on why every car has 42.0-42.5" of front legroom, at least as listed in its specs. Those of us of a taller persuasion do take an interest in such things.
Also, why are there so damn few cars that fit a tall guy anymore? I'm guessing airbag positions and the like, but 6'4 of me used to have so much room in a first and second gen CRX, that with the seat all the way back, I couldn't operate the pedals. In my old W116, also with the seat all the way back, I damn near couldn't reach the pedals. These were outliers, but not totally unusual.
Also, is there not a standard by which these measurements are done? The published specs are near enough useless on determining if a tall guy will fit.
and increased dashboard size. I'm not that tall -- six-two now that the ortho cut almost an inch out of my leg getting it glued to a pin -- and I continually find my shoulders rubbing on the window. My old 911 felt absurdly spacious; it wasn't, but the car didn't LEAN IN ON YOU.
Makes much sense. Plus stupid sized consoles full of nothing, squeezing you in from the other.
Then there are of course the monster think B pillars. If you can get your seat back far enough, you end up face to face with a 6 inch wide piece of grey plastic.
From what I've read -- and I'm probably wrong -- is that most automakers (GM often listed by name) use 95th percentile dummies for their designs, whereas Mercedes used 99th percentile dummies. I do remember being stunned by the seat travel in my first Mercedes.
That makes a lot of sense. Interestingly though, the recent production cars that had far and away the most front legroom were thr GM Epsilon II LWB (Lucerne, Impala, XTS). Those were huge, at least in terms of front legroom.
Before that, it was the first Gen LX based 300, Charger and Magnum. You see a lot of guys well over 6'6 driving those.
And while I know it's bad taste to reply to your own post, I just wanted to chime in to nominate the Merc W116 line as the best cars ever made. Better designed and built than anything Rolls ever did. Craftsmanship like Aston never dreamed of. The sheet metal seems to have come directly from the Panzer plant. They were built to run forever, and if they did go wrong, they were a pleasure to wrench on. The 450 was likely the sweet spot of the line and would happily cruise at extra legal speeds without breaking a sweat. Man, what a great car!
Impossibly nerdy and unconfident high school me thought the W116 was so cool that if I only had one it would transform me into someone who knew just what to do in every situation. It's probably for the best that I had no idea the answer was actually not the world's best car but "screw stuff up repeatedly over the next 30 years."
Just last night I heard what I think was a legitimate interview of Michael Jackson talking about how evil Joe was. In the entertainment industry at least it seems like child abuse is a major contributor to accomplishment.
shirley temple--another beverly hills hotel bungalow dweller--wanted me to be in a movie with her. our nextdoor neighbors, john loder and hedy lamarr, said they'd put in a good word for us. my mother took me aside and said no; there are people in the movie business who get away with doing really bad things to children. to me, mom's no meant no. 1939
Did any of the kids MJ went on to abuse make any contributions to music? Or did they just suffer in silence. That creep should be in the same category as Gary Glitter and Jimmy Saville.
I don't know what their parents were trying to achieve by putting them in that position. It may have been a long term plan of getting access to the music industry and the child sex trafficking was secondary, or they may have just been pimps looking for a payout. Either way they are at least as reprehensible as he is, they are just not famous. To your point, our host did an article about "small souls," the idea that if someone makes a really good movie like Chinatown, or have a good defensive line at a college powerhouse then their victims don't matter to a large portion of the public.
I didn't know about that one. As if I needed another reason to hate the fuckin' eagles. I love how the cops show up and arrest the girl, and he writes a song about it. Very classy.
The best "Philly Sound" band came from Detroit. Fight me. Rubberband Man is arguably the most infectious song ever recorded.
Totally agree, when I think about Black music from the seventies, my mind goes to this song
Maxine Nightingale: Get Right Back to Where You Started From.
Billy Ocean: Red Light Spells Danger.
Though Billy Ocean is almost unheard of over here.
I will forever associate that Maxine Nightingale song with the movie Slap Shot.
I'M LISTENING TO THE FUCKIN' SONG!
They brought their fucking toys with ‘em!
SHE'S A LESBIAN! A LESBIAN!
I play Electric Six's cover of Rubberband Man all the time...my kids HATE it, which brings me even more joy.
Come for the spicy insider accounts of the automotive industry, stay for some cultural enlightenment.
Offhand, I can think of three unmentioned Spinners hits without consulting the internet: "I'll Be Around," "Could It Be I'm Falling In Love," and "One of a Kind (Love Affair)." And I forgot about the Motown-era hit "It's a Shame."
The Temptations were finished as a crossover act when the Spinners came on - none of their post-Norman Whitfield stuff made a dent on the pop charts. Really, Motown was a shell of itself after 1972 when Berry Gordy moved the company to Los Angeles to focus on making Diana Ross a movie star. The Funk Brothers stayed behind in Detroit. So did the Four Tops and Gladys Knight & the Pips, who subsequently had some of their biggest hits - "Ain't No Woman (Like the One I've Got)" and "Midnight Train to Georgia," respectively - for other labels. Stevie Wonder was huge, obviously, as were the Commodores and Marvin Gaye. But the hit factory was dead and the other acts increasingly stuck to the R&B charts.
I wouldn't call the Spinners an unfamiliar act to white audiences and even dismissing them as a minor soul/R&B act seems a bit unfair. Then again, I can readily name all three Temps lead singers (David Ruffin, Eddie Kendricks, and Dennis Edwards), but this is the first I've heard of Mr. Wynne. I see that he died in 1984, the same year as two other soul legends who joined the "nightshift" too early: Marvin Gaye and Jackie Wilson.
I think "second-tier" is better than "minor", the same way that, for example, Boston was a second-tier rock group. No shortage of hits, but no long-term staying power.
No staying power because studio band?
More like no staying power because Tom Scholz took two years put out a second album and another eight for the third.
And said everything he had to say on that first album to boot
The Funk Brothers didn't stay behind. They were left behind. They showed up to the studio to find a note on the door saying that Motown had moved to LA. This was after Gordy hired private detectives to find out if any of the Brothers were getting side work at other studios (they were).
Speaking of Nightshift, have you heard the hilarious Springsteen cover of that estimable tune? It’ll make you laugh out loud.
Yeah, actually I didn't totally hate it. It's an odd choice for him to cover, but I think the song kinda suits his voice. Which is completely shot.
Can't say the same for the rest of his new covers album. Him trying to do shouty soul songs with his weak-ass vocals is embarrassing. And he needs to dump the producer that made everything sound like a K-Tel rerecording. Where's the E Street Band?
It’s horrible. Obviously no one told him it was a bad idea before or after.
I miss singing that's not processed into synth sounds, bands with four-strong horn sections, and precise execution in the studio or in live performance.
People would still eat up this sort of music today but the labels will never greenlight it because it's too difficult and expensive to make.
Thanks for the trip down memory lane.
I watched The Song Remains the Same the other day for the first time ever, and was totally blown away by their timing and execution while obviously on tremendous amounts of drugs and alcohol. I'm sure there was plenty of remastering and there are some obvious dubbing artifacts throughout, but today, that would involve basically a huge on stage production of prearranged music and lip synching. It was all about the music, not the personal lives of the bands, or the amazing production values or wardrobe or whatever (despite Jimmy's dragon suit)--all of that seemed to come later.
Many of the later Zep shows were absolutely shambolic, as were the studio sessions, because Pagey and Bonzo couldn't stay sober for ten minutes. Apparently "Presence" is dammed close to being a Plant/Jones duo record. They would work normal hours and leave tracks for Jimmy and Bonham to work with in the event either of them actually came into the studio.
In Through the Out Door, it was.
No other famous rock guitarist so brutally lost their chops the way Jimmy did/has.
"but the labels will never greenlight it because it's too difficult and expensive to make."
I think they need better talent than we have today, and they would need a lot less "engineering and producing". I have seen many live performances from the so called classic rock era that most entertainers could not match today. Without Auto Tune and Pro Tools many of the current generation would go nowhere.
Another aspect to it: the days of selling three million CDs at a retail price of $12.99 in 1987 dollars, or cassettes for $8.99 in 1982 dollars, or vinyl for $7.99 in 1977 dollars. are long gone. Something I just read, that lines up well with what I've read elsewhere, based on mechanical performance royalties:
"Justin Bieber’s song, Love Yourself, was written by Ed Sheeran, Benjamin Levin, and Bieber. It was released by Def Jam record label. The song has been streamed 17.4 million times. With the $0.091 per stream mechanical royalty, it should generate about $1,583,400. The streaming platforms will pay the whole sum to Def Jam as the label. Def Jam will then distribute the whole sum to everyone involved in making the song according to their roles."
Now compare that to Britney Spears selling 10 million cassette and CD singles of "Baby One More Time", which put perhaps $12-15 million in the pockets of the label. In 1998. So thirty million bucks or more in today's money.
All the people who run the business still need to make outrageous sums so they have extracted the difference out of studio time, touring support, studio musicians and producers, and all the remaining apparatus of the biz.
Most of today's hits are done via ProTools in a small studio. The expense is a fraction of what you paid in the Steely Dan days. And if you use electronic instruments you can do the whole song with vocal tracks and a MIDI pad.
I get what you're saying Jack, but I think there are other aspects to it as well.
For one, in the past there were fewer "musical pyramids" and they were much larger. Meaning, the music was "grouped" into fewer "categories", and each category was huge. So, if you could get into any particular category, you could really clean up.
The other part is the *real* reason "why digital ruined everything." Before digital, *talented* people had to hone their skills before they would be heard by anyone who could make them part of the business. There was no way to fake the talent. You also had to have the presence, and in pre-social-media age, everything was in-person, so people learned how to put on a show (say, the Beatles' Munich years). And the people who run the business then got to skim off the top of that talent pool. Today, because anyone can produce a song, or an album, it is much more difficult to separate the signal from the noise, and there is A LOT of noise.
I like how Tim Rice put it when he was a guest on Top Gear: "In the past, if you got to make a record, a lot of people had to have heard AND liked your music. Today, if you make a CD, it means *you* like it."
The live music scene is dead as a doornail, killed by people who would rather have their headphones on. So where are you gonna learn the craft?
Not only that, but how many of the "yuts" today even fully appreciate in-person experience? I mean, why bother, when you can watch someone else's brief social media video of the event? You know, the one that starts with the shot of the person making the video, maybe their outfit, their friends, the "craaazy" show setup (like, totally), a few seconds of the main act, and then closes with yet another shot of the person making the video.
On a mostly unrelated note: my neighbors occasionally enjoy 16-18 hour parties that go until 04:00. And to my aging ears, through the mostly concrete walls, it all sounds the same, almost as if they're playing the same tune the entire time. Are my ears deceiving me, or has the sound really become that homogenized?
Everything is cheaper, disposable, and less appreciated. For all the things we've been instructed to feel entitled to quality has been carefully left out.
Why bother with quality, if you are "entitled to" replacing things every couple of years?
This is a very interesting topic. I know virtually noting about the business of producing music but as a listener the product that the business is giving us is worse than it was before the internet, and the use of computers and software to construct music. Is there anyone doing it the "old way" these days?
Just wait until "AI" starts generating music. Then again, judging by the sound of it, maybe that's what's been going on for years already ...
Part of the difficulty and expense is finding that talent. It's out there today. I've heard singers in local bars and even church gigs that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. But it takes a lot more effort to find those people than to look at someone's Instagram and see immediately that they'll look right in the video and on the album cover, secure in the knowledge that you can AutoTune and time-shift their voice into submission.
I completely agree. When I was a kid my grandmother, sometimes accompanied by my dad, would sing in church and it would always be a packed house. Looking back I am amazed at how good they were having no formal training. Much better than most of what we have today. The raw talent is still out there.
"If you want to be a writer ... all that really matters is the craft and what you produce. ... Whether it is seen by seven people or seven billion people."
Man, I hope this is true. My first four novels were published by one of the NYC biggies. When I lost that ride, I self-published a couple of books. I suppose a hundred people read each one. Most recently, I took a decent (but not strong enough) book that I didn't feel like revising again and simply asked my Facebook friends if they wanted me to email them a Word file. More than seven people read it. But not a LOT more than seven.
Melville died broke and with his reputation as a serviceable writer of travel tales torn into tatters by an unlovable disappointment of a book about the whaling business.
However, Melville died broke.
Celebrate, brother. You are one of the extremely small number of people who not only wrote four books, but had them published. By definition, that puts you amongst the most successful writers of all time. Be proud. You've done something amazing. And yes, I'm being dead serious.
My first book has yet to be finished, let alone published. In my youth, I was told often that I was a great writer, as I skated and half assed my way through school and university by producing work that said nothing of any true value or offered any great insights, but said it well enough that I could earn myself a degree. I spent the last decades squandering my gifts on corporate BS where I again struggled mightily to say nothing at all, while giving all the appearance of saying something. Of late, as I've actually wanted to start writing something of value at least to me, it feels like my muse has abandoned me. All my thoughts seem to come out in email size pieces now. I've even considered taking journalism courses, if only to have someone to call me on my BS and get me back on the writing path again. But the state of modern journalism makes me wonder if I'd end up any better off.
So what kind of books do you write? Where should I start exploring your work?
You are a gentleman and a scholar! My books with Minotaur/St. Martin's were a mystery series; the first one, and the one that sold best, is titled Purgatory Chasm. Whatever you do, don't take journalism classes. Complete waste of time (says this longtime journo). Just set an achievable word goal for each day (suggestion: 350, because it's not intimidating but it's more than a page) and don't get out of the chair until you've hit the mark. Take weekends off. In eight or nine months, you'll have a draft.
Thanks Steve.
I get what you are saying about Journalism schools. I'm still of the generation where we thought that there should be a teacher/mentor out there somewhere who would share their knowledge and experience, and help us hone our craft. However, it seems those days are mostly behind us.
Was shopping for your book, and just wanted to ask if a paper, kindle or audiobook version benefited you the most. I'd prefer to support you if I can, because as Luca Brazzi said, "After-all , we are not communists."
It seems that the paper copies are not easily available in Canaduh. Is there a better place to order from then Amazon?
I must very humbly apologize to my fellow denizens of ACF. When I wrote Luca Brazzi above, that was in error. As any real man would know, of course I meant Emilio Barzini.
It’s worth trolling through old Midnight Special or Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert clips from the 70’s if you have an hour to kill.
The Spinners, the Ohio Players, TRex: Really some amazing performances.
There’s some great James Brown stuff and a killer version of BB King and Gladys Knight doing the Thrill is Gone.
For pure astonishment- look for Exile doing Kiss You All Over.
Check out Kool & the Gang performing "Jungle Boogie" on Soul Train, and then tumble down the Soul Train 70s rabbit hole.
Freda Payne singing Band of Gold on Soul Train has me hypnotized
wow - thank you for the recommendation
I’ll check it out. That’s one strange song lyrically, though.
I didn't notice any lyrics. Must have been distracted.
Is this it, with Lou Rawls intro?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8PWIlSoCrQ
SEVERAL things to notice here:
0) Freda
1) the bass player watching the music instead of THAT ASS
2) the old-ass guitar player on the DANELECTRO CORAL PURPLE ELECTRIC SITAR
3) all of it
That wasnt the one but holy shit
You raised a point that I'd been mulling over of late. I was a kid in the mid 70s, when the American Graffiti/ Happy Days thing was all the rage. As it all happened before I was born, it could have been set 100 years in the past for as much as I could relate to it. Looking back now, it's weird to imagine that those movies and shows were nostalgic for something that only happened 10 or 12 years earlier. By current standards, that would be a show taking place in 2010. And while I do feel some nostalgia for the days before the world of the woke, I can't imagine many times in history when the youth of an era pined so openly for something that only happened a decade earlier. But then again, it does seem that boomers have never been willing or able to grow up.
Boomer desires bent culture like black holes bend light.
American Graffiti was filmed TEN YEARS after the era it purports to depict.
and it was just like the teen scene in '52, believe me! tail end of korea subbing for 'nam. seriously if they'd said '52 instead of '62 you'd just have to change a few of the cars for it to work! i was there--a bit in l.a. even!
I think most Boomers were too young in the 1950s to have had genuine nostalgia for the era. I guess it's a bit like Fiddler on the Roof. American Jews of my parents' generation had nostalgia for the shtetls of their grandparents that they personally never experienced.
Clearly you've never seen someone pay $15,000 cash for a middling-condition of the BMX bike they rode when they were eleven. :)
Don’t look on eBay at what people are asking for mid90s computer equipment. Also, don’t ask me why I know.
What's my Sparc 5 worth? :)
Working condition? Probably a lot.
Whenever I look at vintage Sun stuff on eBay, I notice that all the computers on offer have the memory stripped out, along with any hard drive sleds, and all the other stuff needed to make a functioning system. Keyboard/mouse? Fuggeddaboutit.
Basically all there is are the case, power supply, and motherboard. It would take more than the asking price to get it working again.
I'm active in the audio hobby, and have watched the top of the 1970s vintage receivers go from a couple of hundred bucks 15 years ago, to $7-10k now. There is dramatically better quality gear available now, for dramatically less money. New, let alone used. But nostalgia hits hard.
You could just @ me!
- Guy whose conversation piece in his office is a cherry Sony STR-GX9ES, for which he paid an uncomfortable amount
Sorry, can't hear you over my restored Marantz receiver.
I wonder what the Fisher FM-100-B tuner is worth that my late uncle gave me when he went solid state. I wouldn't mind an old Empire 598 or 698 turntable, built like tanks, they go for four figures. When I was in college they were getting closed out and a friend bought one for like Pioneer money.
Modern Class D amps are quite impressive, particularly for the money. For about $10 you can buy a 100WPC fully functional power amp module with a Texas Instruments class D chip (power output is dependent on what kind of laptop power supply you're using, you're not going to get 100 watts out of a 24V 3A supply). My home stereo has a Adcom 555 200WPC amp, with a Reference Line passive preamp. Stuff that's at least 20 years old. Unless I spend some real serious money, with ears that are almost 68 years old I doubt either modern or vintage equipment is going to sound any better to me than what I have. When I was in NYC a few years ago, I heard a system with McIntosh electronics and Focal speakers at Alex Roy's audio salon that was revelatory, but I think the system cost something like $40k.
!! .
-Nate
The 50s nostalgia definitely got its start in the 70s, but I always thought it hit its stride in the 80s (see, e.g., Back to the Future) and wound down by the early 90s (see, e.g., The Sandlot) just in time for 60s nostalgia to kick in (see, e.g. Forest Gump). The 60s nostalgia is 100% no doubt boomer driven. I always attributed 50s nostalgia to the late-silents and some of the early boomers, the difference between which may be hard to perceive in some aspects. Regardless, it seems like there’s an approximately 30 year nostalgia cycle at least in the post war period. However, I don’t think it’s been quite as strong in the past decade or so.
When I was in elementary/middle school in the 70s and we had a 50s dress up day, because Happy Days, there was a definite difference in styles. Maybe I'm out of touch but I don't see where there would be much of a difference wearing George W Bush era clothing.
For better or worse, a good portion of my closet would agree with you.
I think a good illustration of the point is the first scene in Back to the Future where Marty is in downtown Hill Valley. The extent to which his reactions drive home how different things are is really interesting. I once argued that there was more of a difference between 55 and 85 than there was between 85 and 15, and, other than certain aspects of smart phones and the internet, I think the statement is largely true.
In '55 the state of the art in fighter planes was the F-86 and F-104. By 85, those airframes had been long since replaced in the USAF inventory, and our primary jets were the F-16 and F-15 with a dwindling number of F-4s holding on. We still fly and produce the 16 and the 15, which are now 50-ish year old designs. Hell, we just ordered some more F-15s.
I own a 50s automobile, and my first car was a mid-80s automobile. There are worlds of difference between the two. Not so much between my 87 and any other car I've had subsequent.
Between 1955 and 1985 we went from no home video to it being common place. The primary difference since then has been an increase in access and resolution.
Computers are a little different. The differences between 55 and 85 and 85 and 15 are probably equally significant. However, the idea of someone using a computer for daily tasks or having one in a home was far from unheard of by 85. Moreover, the rate of obsolescence in computing, especially for laptops and desktops, has certainly slowed in the past 10-15 years. I still get frequent use out of a 12 year old desktop, and most people would likely be fine with a similar vintage system for most common computer tasks today.
None of this even gets into culture. However, I think it's fair to say that the changes that made the difference so shocking for Marty and that we continue to see today went through their most significant transition between 55 and 85. Everything since then has been the proverbial slippery slope.
Surprising subject matter today and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I certainly had no idea of this backstory, even as someone who includes "Games People Play" pretty often in my karaoke selections. Now: time to go dial up that live performance....
Don't be hating on the Casio keyboard!!!
Knowing PRACTICALLY nothing about R&B, there are a couple of things you describe here that stick out in order of importance:
That ability to convey a set of emotions utterly convincingly (whether personally experienced by the artist or not) is real artistic TALENT. period, No matter the genre or medium.
That description of the audience during those times makes me wish that was the case with the broader ethnic community today.
The only Spinners song I could name is Rubberband Man. I will definitely give Sadie a listen today, thank you for this Jack.
Played it three or four times today on Spotify, your analysis is spot on Jack. I’m a bit embarrassed that I’ve never heard of the song previously, given my age.
"to standards that were well below “Steely Dan” but also not Springsteen’s “Nebraska”."
I probably ought to be embarrassed that I know _exactly_ what you mean by this, but I find solace knowing that you are just as big a nerd as I am when it comes to this sort of thing.
And with regard to this: "Mighty Love, however, was no Use Your Illusion," you're saying The Spinners' second album was not bloated, self-indulgent, and in need of editing?
I kid. Mostly.
Growing up in the 70's in the Phila "tri-state-area", Gamble and Huff's Philly International sound was the sound of my youth. Wonderful groups mixed by the recently deceased Joe Tarsia of Sigma Sound with one heck of a group of sessions players. The Spinners, O’Jays, the Stylistics, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Teddy Prendergast, Delfonics, Billy Paul, the Intruders, Lou Rawls, MFSB. The best!
"I didn't know you like the Delfonics"
WDAS - FM ;-)
Man, what a movie.
The Spinners were all over WFIL too ! I didn’t have one of those fancy FM radios until 79 or so.
Definitely remember the spinners. I don't know if that's because I grew up in NY, but they were on the radio and played at parties back when I was in school.
Whee ! well said Jack .
I love The Spinners and never grasped why they didn't become a mega hit group .
The Blues is uniquely American music yet it seems far too many Americans don't 'get' it .
-Nate
Apropos of nothing, we need an article on why every car has 42.0-42.5" of front legroom, at least as listed in its specs. Those of us of a taller persuasion do take an interest in such things.
Also, why are there so damn few cars that fit a tall guy anymore? I'm guessing airbag positions and the like, but 6'4 of me used to have so much room in a first and second gen CRX, that with the seat all the way back, I couldn't operate the pedals. In my old W116, also with the seat all the way back, I damn near couldn't reach the pedals. These were outliers, but not totally unusual.
Also, is there not a standard by which these measurements are done? The published specs are near enough useless on determining if a tall guy will fit.
The answer, sir, is
TUMBLEHOME
and increased dashboard size. I'm not that tall -- six-two now that the ortho cut almost an inch out of my leg getting it glued to a pin -- and I continually find my shoulders rubbing on the window. My old 911 felt absurdly spacious; it wasn't, but the car didn't LEAN IN ON YOU.
Makes much sense. Plus stupid sized consoles full of nothing, squeezing you in from the other.
Then there are of course the monster think B pillars. If you can get your seat back far enough, you end up face to face with a 6 inch wide piece of grey plastic.
From what I've read -- and I'm probably wrong -- is that most automakers (GM often listed by name) use 95th percentile dummies for their designs, whereas Mercedes used 99th percentile dummies. I do remember being stunned by the seat travel in my first Mercedes.
I believe that the F-22 is the first fighter in USAF inventory that doesn’t have a maximum allowable height for pilots.
'14 audi rs7 has unreachable pedals at full extension; i've shrunk to just over 6' in my old age
That makes a lot of sense. Interestingly though, the recent production cars that had far and away the most front legroom were thr GM Epsilon II LWB (Lucerne, Impala, XTS). Those were huge, at least in terms of front legroom.
Before that, it was the first Gen LX based 300, Charger and Magnum. You see a lot of guys well over 6'6 driving those.
And while I know it's bad taste to reply to your own post, I just wanted to chime in to nominate the Merc W116 line as the best cars ever made. Better designed and built than anything Rolls ever did. Craftsmanship like Aston never dreamed of. The sheet metal seems to have come directly from the Panzer plant. They were built to run forever, and if they did go wrong, they were a pleasure to wrench on. The 450 was likely the sweet spot of the line and would happily cruise at extra legal speeds without breaking a sweat. Man, what a great car!
Impossibly nerdy and unconfident high school me thought the W116 was so cool that if I only had one it would transform me into someone who knew just what to do in every situation. It's probably for the best that I had no idea the answer was actually not the world's best car but "screw stuff up repeatedly over the next 30 years."
Just last night I heard what I think was a legitimate interview of Michael Jackson talking about how evil Joe was. In the entertainment industry at least it seems like child abuse is a major contributor to accomplishment.
shirley temple--another beverly hills hotel bungalow dweller--wanted me to be in a movie with her. our nextdoor neighbors, john loder and hedy lamarr, said they'd put in a good word for us. my mother took me aside and said no; there are people in the movie business who get away with doing really bad things to children. to me, mom's no meant no. 1939
God almighty- in 1939?
You need to start your own substack.
Did any of the kids MJ went on to abuse make any contributions to music? Or did they just suffer in silence. That creep should be in the same category as Gary Glitter and Jimmy Saville.
I don't know what their parents were trying to achieve by putting them in that position. It may have been a long term plan of getting access to the music industry and the child sex trafficking was secondary, or they may have just been pimps looking for a payout. Either way they are at least as reprehensible as he is, they are just not famous. To your point, our host did an article about "small souls," the idea that if someone makes a really good movie like Chinatown, or have a good defensive line at a college powerhouse then their victims don't matter to a large portion of the public.
I should have included Don Henley in that gallery of the despicable.
I didn't know about that one. As if I needed another reason to hate the fuckin' eagles. I love how the cops show up and arrest the girl, and he writes a song about it. Very classy.