From: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org (shindell-list-digest) To: shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Subject: shindell-list-digest V4 #329 Reply-To: shindell-list@smoe.org Sender: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-shindell-list-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk shindell-list-digest Wednesday, December 18 2002 Volume 04 : Number 329 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [RS] Re: live and skipping [tneff@panix.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 18 Dec 2002 01:00:34 -0500 From: tneff@panix.com Subject: [RS] Re: live and skipping RockinRonD@aol.com writes: > There is little doubt that Dar's live album was strictly a money making > project. I don't know how anyone else feels, but I always got the idea, > right from the start, that the record was slapped together in haste just > to get more product out to a market that was beginning to peak with the > climax of The Green World tour. I'm not condemning AGF or anything---I > hope Dar made a hefty chunk of change on it. God knows the woman > deserves it. This is wrong and unfair and bringeth me out of lurk mode. Well, that and seeing La Roche post, which is a little bit like watching the tiny Cosmo twins sing for Mothra, and then the giant eyespotted Gaia-avenging insect appears and commences screeching white fire towards Gojira. But where was I. In the first place, it is relatively rare for the management company (who simply represents the performer) to lobby for a live album. That is usually the idee fixe of the label, who wants to reprise yesterday's hits with lower production costs. Depending on the terms of the contract (CWH would know but I anticipate his discretion) a live disc may not even "count" towards the total albums required. It's a record company thing. Secondly, "Out There Live" was neither more nor less carefully planned than "Courier," and represents neither more nor less honesty in execution. If I'm in a critical mode I actually consider neither of them to be a revelation. But listeners seem to like them both a whole bunch, and that works for me. They are comparable efforts. The only difference I can see (and I assign no value judgment either way) is that Dar appears poised to break out in some new directions, while Richard is still mining the dazzling vein of creativity that's brung him thus far. For both artists, the live discs represent a snapshot of the work done thus far, and we're lucky to have them. PETER FREY wrote: > At the risk of being kicked off the list with my first post, I have a > question to ask about "Sparrows Point". I will preface by saying Richard > Shindell is one of my favorite songwriters (in company with Richard > Thompson, Townes VanZandt, etc...). Sparrow Point has alot of incredible > songs (The Courier, On a Sea OF Feur-De-Lis Nora, etc), but I have > trouble listening to the CD. To me either the CD I have is defective > (which I have already sent one back) or the quality of the master is > lacking. It is hard to describe, but it almost sounds as if I am > listening to a vinyl, where the record skips ahead a small microsecond. It always irks me to see newcomers fretting about imminent ejection, punishment etc - it makes me wonder what hellish listserv Gulag is lurking out there! :) Anyway, Peter is right, I have always noticed the spot in "Sparrow's Point" (the song) - there is a point about 2/3 of the way through where a fraction of a second of sound seems to have been sliced out. I always assumed this was a mastering error, but I've never put the WAV up on blocks to prove it. I know what he means. P.S. In the classic Toho productions of the 60's and 70's, the Cosmos appeared on screen as twins but were actually played by one actress. When the film series was revived in the 1990's, they stopped using the cheezy split screen process and employed two actresses as the Cosmos. I have a marvelous proof that this represents the decline of modern cinema, but it is too long to fit in this margin. ------------------------------ End of shindell-list-digest V4 #329 ***********************************