Shelter
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Posts posted by Shelter
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What do you think happens when they finish an album but before they start a tour? Do they run through all the songs and decide then and there what makes the set list and what doesn't?
Probably, right? Although.. it seems. with Hypnotic Eye.. as was the case with Mojo too.. it was pretty darn decided already when the pre-release "singles" came out, what they were gonna do for promoting the album when on the road, what songs they believed in. I doubt they gave all the songs a fair shot, and as is always the case, they should have tried a lot more (most) of them out live, at least a few times.
Is it dependent on how they perform the song, not how they've recorded it?
One would think so. Or at least hope so. Since it's playing it live that would be the point of playing a song at all, once it is recorded. That said, I'm sure most songs in the cataloge could be tweaked, with more or less artistic deft:ness, into great contemporary live versions. It's just that TP rarely approach things that way. From the look of it, he/they prefer to do the songs pretty much as is on the record. Save for adding a solo or extend an ending or something, they very rarely venture far reworking their material. This may explain how some songs, despite the best intentions of reheasing 50-60 songs for a tour, if they don't immediately fit as is/was, they are deemed too much work or too uninspiring to compete with I Won't Back Down and get duly scratched. However, this couldn't possibly explain the lot of it, since a good many songs would probably need next to none tweaking to rock wickedly. And then again - there is the occasional Kings Highway or odd American Girl to disprove my point. As if just for saying "You know, once in a blue moon we DO change things around, so sh*t up!" Fair enough, sometimes they don't just change the key or the speed, they pick one whole different song. If only that happened every night - or at least every tour.
Did they think this one wouldn't go over well in the show? Do they not like it? Was it challenging to sing?
Who knows. Beats me. I think it's shimmering. A underrated classic if I ever heard one, a song that is likely to work fine close to it's original version and also as heavily reworked, if prefered. With Howie - and now Scott - I can't see why this wouldn't be quite wonderful to sing, how it wouldn't go over smashing. Key change if needed is no problem. All attemts at understanding or analyzing this set list issue, that I've ever encountered end up missing it's mark. And this is just another one of these dozens of engimas really, all coming down to one thing: What TP feel like doing. That has to be all there is to it, in 99% of the cases. No more no less. Allmost all other clues are dead ends. So here's to him changing his mind.
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So I tried to.. eh.. enunciate my understanding of this guns vs ignorance business yo'all discuss. I tried several times. But it seems beyond me not to f*ck it up with obnoxious attitude and philosophical bickering bound to miss its mark. I just can't help myself. I'm like a loaded gun, one might say. I've simply come to conclusion that I just can't do this without pissing someone off, being it totally awesome people or fans of Charlton Heston. Besides, I'm not sure I have the mandate. I guess this here paragraph will have to do.
As for the implication of the thread's headline "best since Mary Jane's Last Dance".. I thought about that some more and.. well.. I would not say it's THE best. But certainly, given that the other ones are Crawling Back To You, You Wreck Me, Wake Up Time, Swingin', Echo (song), Lost Children, have Love Will Travel, Dreamville, Trip To Pirate's Cove, Good Enough, Something Good Coming, American Dream Plan B, U Get Me High, Full Grown Boy and.. one or two more, then Shadow People certainly belongs on the imaginary Best Of... vol 2.
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My point exactly. And maybe these groups are not where the big money is. TPHB have become a niche kind of thing.
It seems like you are deliberately trying to slip out from under the weight of my argument.
I agree TP is "niche" in the sense that he/they draw mainly people who used to buy records already in the 80s and 90s - not to say the original rock generation, the ones who created the monster in the first place, by hocking their possensions for radios and turntables already in the 60s and 70s. These are their people. But unlike you I really think that 1) yes, this is where some serious money is* and even if the habit of buying old fashioned records are slowly dying with them, they still buy enough records and attend enough shows - and yes, those to are connected!! - to keep established rock stars like TP well supplied with sandwiches and 2) if streaming and/or a young tight audience were where the money was, TP would have been dumped in the ocean along side Kim Basinger and not that much later (perhaps along with Neil Young, Tom Waits, Dylan, Springsteen, Stones, Sir Paul, Mark Knopfler and a long line of others with dire straits of bankrupcy in the 2000s, due to gray hair and a bad inability to really connect to teenagers, i.e hip hop and rnb fans of global suburbia) and 3) it seems to me, again, it's already been decided, that for whatever target groups, market shares, strategic policies and gross product it may apply, TP has a contract and he is marketable. If not to the same kids as Nikki Minaj. Ok, I think I circled and underlined this m*ther a few times to many now.(*As if people born in the 1940s and 50s are not the generations sitting on the lion share of the planet's wealth?! Statistically speaking. I know there are exceptions, poverty and so on. I will even let you see this: http://www.demos.org/blog/9/8/14/wealth-distributed-extremely-unevenly-within-every-age-Group Never mind the advanced course stuff of "within" yadayada. Just behold the basics. Translated into our language, this means TP fans are the richest people alive. Somehow I'm not one of them, but that is just a bonus copy sold, as far as this argument goes, and so are the one that you are gonna buy I take it, and so on and so forth, but seriously my friend, let's not bury ourselves in collateral damage cases, shall we. I think this horse is dead now. I said what I had to say.)
inexplicable
Yes. Let's call it what it is.
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I'm surprised you put a lot of time into 'em; you've got some sloppy integer work going on there.
Haha! Ah, yes.
This album has some really interesting and unique songs for TPATH and I figure with time, it'll lose its blues reputation and be listened to fresh.
Let's hope so. It should at least be regarded as being as diversified in styles as any other of the albums, is all I'm suggesting. Since, at the end of the day, it might even be more so than most of the others.
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Would have to agree - on the very strong album that is Hypnotic Eye - Shadow People really is among the best tracks, thus a true masterpiece and one of the best in the whole cataloge as far as I'm concerned.
Regrettably I never got to see any of the 2014 shows - not that many HE songs were played, but still - so all the youtube clips been a blessing. This one was fantastic, thanks!
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I think this depends on who is looking at TP. For critics and some rock fans, he might be too commercial. For the guys who try to sell his Music, he might be too "obscure" to be a modern-day mainstream success (I bet there was a reason why a copy of Hypnotic Eye came with a ticket for last year's tour). Though I would not necessarily choose this word. "Too old" may be the more adequate term. From their point of view, that is, not mine.
Obviously. This I understand. Just.. Even if we change focus to "too old", it's a well known fact that "too old" is also exactly what you statistically might want to call the remaining demographic group still in the habit of buying actual records. As far as I can tell there are only three groups left that still does this - collectors, hipsters and "too old" people. Also worth noticing, in this digital age of ours: if the office deem the streaming/download performance to be of key importance and at the same time they find that of TP&TH's to be inadequate, they should cancel his deal and stop releasing his none greatest hits music asap, in order to not lose money, instead of moving ahead and hint a new release.
But true as all that may be, it's beside the point, isn't it?
At least to me, this is not a discussion on whether or not TP has an audience anymore, on who those odd creatures might be or whether or not there is a point in releasing his music anymore. If it was, then yes, perhaps some of everything interesting this thread deals with actually would matter. But to me this is a far less theoretical matter, the decision already been made that Yes, TP is way marketable!!, All The Rest has already been decided on and pitched, if confusingly so, even been said to be "just sitting on the shelf".
That is, while I won't believe it til I see it - the world is, after all, full of ignorant bastards - I regard this particular release - much as I regard the state of TP&TH career in general, for that matter - as something being way beyond hypothetical at this point. That's my perspective. Mid October and I agree with campbellfan1, "ridiculous" really is the word for how this been handled. A low-water mark in many ways.
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Interesting. Because for me it's quite the opposite: The parts are so good, in general, that I would expect them to add up to a bigger sum than they actually do.
What's more, I don't even really hear a sum here. Maybe that's my main problem with the album. It's a collection of really good songs, but not an album. You might say it's an album in a pre-1965-sense, when albums were mere collections of singles.Not hearing a sum is admittedly a problem.
I like the comparsion to the pre65 concept, only that is just what ails me, that a lot of these songs are not good enough as singles, but somehow they fit this specific album context quite well. Now that is not to say that I could imagine it to have been even better, not to say pure magic, had one or two of the lesser moments been better. Still, I just wanted to qualify my quoted logic a bit, since YGGI makes for a good example of the reverse. But let's agree on a logic level then, and to disagree on the practises and effects of it, at least in this case.
Maybe if you just listen more, then one day.. you're gonna get it!
TwoGunslingers reacted to this -
Interesting percentages there.
I'm glad you enjoyed them. Took me ages in the lab to arrive at those..
And still - I'm not sure they are very accurate. Besides, I'm a bit ashamed of using the term "easy going rock". In fact, there's nothing easy about it, even if may sound that way. I guess I's just lazy for not breaking it up in further, more detailed characterizations, but truth is.. at least my point just is.. that TP&TH have their very own brand of rock'n'roll, more or less varied in style, beat and temper, but yet always uniquely their own - on Mojo as much as on other albums. Thus, what I, in the above quote, did call "blues", "straight rock'n'roll" or "balladry" are very approx notions. Perhaps needles to say (sometimes even I like to speak straight).
Sure, there might be a "blues styled" tune more than usual on Mojo, but to me that's far from as prominent as certain features that other albums may have. Yet you rarely hear a lot of fans speak about the Shelter label albums as blues records, the early 80s as the country years or Hypnotic Eye as a jazz album. But somehow Mojo hits home as a blues album in people's minds. A very misunderstood album as I see it. Misunderstood for better AND for worse, I might add.
In general, it seems like Mojo is where you and I meet in terms of sharing opinions on an album. (Even more in agreement than we are in the age old set list issue.) Like you say, it's the difference in approach - towards being a band and towards recording as such - rather than in a change in overall musical style, that is the big deal with Mojo. That is, the music is at the same time unique, varied and typical, the way it usually is. And like dollardime said (above), it's long since - at least since Last DJ, may I add - pointless to believe in anything the marketing spin doctors have to say about an upcoming album. That's not my issue here. They are full of crap, and I'm no less naive in this issue than I am in the drug issue or moeny issue or whatever - we are, after all, talking Rock'n'Roll here, not the Holy Church of Jesus the Samaritan. (I suppose my bull shit meter is just case sensitive, so shoot me.) I suppose most fans do normally realize and mentally cathes on to these things, but there is a general tendency towards romantization and easy solutions, that's part of rock'n'roll too. Neverhteless - the thing with Mojo - as I've experienced it - is that most people I know doesn't seem to see through the marketing.. They genuinely seem to see Mojo as such a musically narrow and different album for being TP&TH. I just don't see it. I just find it.. well.. stupid?
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Roll on John
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How extraordinarily bizarre. Perhaps not surprisingly I can spot at least 20 bands on that 32 band list, better than Bon Jovi. Better subjectively, cause I really think so. And better by far also objectively, since these bands have had so much more cultural, artistic and even commercial impact over the years. Not that JBJ hasn't cashed in big league style, but in terms of this poll, he basically managed to social media hype his loyal troops into voteing. I won't give their love a bad name, but they know they are wrong to even be mentioned in the same room as the likes of Creedence, The Doors or the White Stripes.. come on.. not to mention TP&TH. I normally wouldn't, but... *vote*
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"How can all these people afford so many things? When I was young people wore what they had on."
Neil Young, Greendale
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Man, what is it with you and crappy songs with the word "ain't" in them..?
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Happy birthday!
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Maybe! Haha! Tell me, why is a photo of TP smoking a cigarette so sexy! Lord know I wish he would quit so we have him around for a while longer by there is just something about the way he smokes.....sigh......
and the way he works that morgue, right
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Of course we all differ on what makes the cut, while I'd drop "I Shot the..." I mean, "Don't Pull Me Over" someone else will want to keep it.
Nah, let's just drop it.
"Desptie"? What does that even mean anyway...
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Often reading these intimate details feels a bit strange and uncomfortable for me. (---) I think their personal life is their business, my curiosity is more on why the set lists are so static or what it was like recording Mary Jane, etc.
Exactly. I can very much relate to that. It's just that sometimes it's the same thing.. Sometimes new dimensions in the material or the recording are opened up from learning biographical stuff. Especially when really hooked on something (pun, but no fun) and having a lot of keys and background already informing your decoding of things, if only in the margins and minor emotional hues. Then again, it's not always beneficent to your free and vivid imagination to know too much, so.. this certainly id one of the most tricky trade-offs for me. I am really not at all interested in the tabloid aspects of most of my "idols" for the sake of it.
It seems appropriate to hear from Billy The Kid at this time, especially this version and introduction!
Ah, yes.. Thanks! That's fantastic! (Equally fantastic to me - but in a sad way - how those guys are deemed "hard core", simply cause they recognized an Echo song. I know it's meant to be ingratiating, but really now? Or is the remark to be understood strictly in the live context, whereas being aware of anything outside of the greatest hits list per definition make you qualify as hard core? Either way, how come TP finds it strange that their fans know their stuff? How low do they really think of themselves? I'm just glad - Echo or not, private ghosts or not - that occasionally they play for the bunch of us called "fans", bringing stuff like this out, that their "normal" crowds are clueless about. Pure gold!)
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All these speculations of ours. As if it wasn't already decided and announced that the album is gonna come out. The reason I started to ask for a date in the first place (and in the second place, third place and so on.. and that was even when the calender still had 20th anniversary as the basic idea, some almost two years ago..) was that it was announced that it's gonna happen. Not that there was a fat chance it would happen one of these years. I mean let's not kid ourselves. These guys know what they do. All level guys involved, that is. If they can flog a commercial harakiri live 12" EP with Mudcrutch, they sure can make a decent archival release of something as mammoth, comparatively speaking, as a Tom Petty heydays Wildflowers kin happen.
Seriously guys - I get to hear this all the time (I even read about it just hours ago, in the Warren Zanes article, on the upcoming TP bio book - that btw has a date since a while back - November 10!!) - TP has "too many hits", he's "too commercially successful and popular" to play "serious" (that is deep and mixed) live sets focusing on other things than all those hits, or to even be granted a "serious" legacy (that is achieve substantial praise from certain critics) in rock history. The guys is the freaking IT of who's the most loved and respected man in classic rock, among fans and especially among musicians.. And now it's like he's also way too obscure? Here we are pondering whether or not his label believe in him enough to release the archival stuff that he proudly wants to share with us? Hello! So, as if Hypnotic Eye didn't prove anything in terms of popularity, then what? So what he has an older and partly different audience than Taylor Swift or Avicii? As if the aging rock fans aren't the ones sitting on all the dough anyway (buying all of Dylan's 18-discs box sets and all that)? Like it wasn't a customer profile group in high demand? As if one disc by TP would be a chanllenge? Hello.
I don't know. These guys are professionals, so they should know what they are doing. They should be in control of this multiple steps, several years, nightmare of an album marketing campaign. Seems fuzzy to me. Usually, on this level - unless you are Axl Rose, and let's ask ourselves if he really is on this level anyway - once you speak of upcoming and even have a title, you deliver. With that logic if the live album that's been more vaguely talked about won't happen - which it serioulsy won't, right? - that's sad and a shame, but somewhat understandable at this point (besides, it may come in other shapes or forms later). Even if Dos Mudcrutch won't happen (perhaps the sessions didn't amount to anything, it's way too early to tell, just theoretically, there is no way of knowing before recording and mixing are done, is there) that would have to be what it is. But in the case of All The Rest compilation (or "album"), there's been so much talk about it, first what it could be, than what it is and what it's called even, there's been a single "from the upcoming album", so if there is one issue on which we are entitled to request a date soon (since after the date announcement, there are usually months before the actual release) it's this one.
So again - date please!
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I don't know if surprising is the word. The gravity of it may come as news from some angles, but then again, not that much is said here, but what's not grave about heroin? Let's not get naive here. My eyes and ears always understood the history thusly: the mid 80s saw the first noticeble destructive drug impact on TP, then it happened again in the pre millenium years. The first of which seemed mostly.. grandiously confused.. to a bystander, while the latter carried a whole lot darker and more menacing qualities, what with divorce, Echo and Howie casting long shadows over the valley of the up 'til recently great wide open.
As TomFest says, it is interesting to ponder the causality of divorce and addiction here, the impact on the songwriting, from what point in time, and so on. Although the article seems to suggest it was divorce and time to think that made him slip deeper into dragon chasing and gloating alike, rather than the other way around. (Speaking of chasing dragons, the 1991/92 tour already had some interesting subtext in this respect too.. "Don't look into his eyes!!". And yet, seemingly, within a few years, he looked.)
May add, interesting also to perhaps finally learn a bit more on to what extent Howie's arrest and passing really landed with TP in the light of all this. Was it a wake up call? Was TP already out of his woods when Howie got terminally lost in his, or did Howie's tragedy somehow help to pull him out?
And yes, as been noted around here before, Zanes' book will be "inzanely" interesting, with Stan being part of it and all.. I really like how TP leveled authorized with bull. Great thinking.
Thanks for posting article!
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And now something pops into my mind that Shelter said somewhere else. To make a really good album, it's not necessarily enough to have a collection of good songs.
Oh, good. Look at that. Here I might add though - as I understand Shelter on this issue - that this obviously true statement has a few more quirks than meets the eye, and can be read somewhat in reverse. That is: while it's sometimes a collection of good songs does not make a good album, sometimes a collection including lesser songs will sufice. Of course those can't be really bad songs, mind you, but it's been known to happen that certain half-*ssed songs do fit their album context quite well. That they even lift the vibe of an album, while in themselves, out of context so to speak, may not be particularly great songs. I think the two titles you mention and YGGI are one of the prime examples in the TP cataloge of this concept. Hard to specify perhaps, but while I agree those two songs may be regarded filler in some sense, I still usually hold the album in my top five, and usually think it more exciting, bold and interesting than both its predecessor and its successor. Actually. A clear case of the total sometimes being greater than its parts.
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^ I always figured the Simpsons was a documentary, chronicling the strives and wicked ways of modern man.
Comedy. Such a time- and place bound concept. Seeing how I have no humor anyway, I may not be the best person to judge, but some good ones are Seinfeld, Father Ted, The Office (US version)
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Indeed, it IS hard not to mention the Beach Boys. Also among my all-time absolute favorites - perhaps more in the goose bumps vein than the jaw dropping vein - would be Ira and Charlie Louvin of the Louvin Brothers.
And - yes, thanks for mentioning them - TP and Howie Epstein. Not only because we're here.. but because.. because. (As recently mentioned by yours truely, listening to Something In The Air for example, or numerous 80s or 90s live appearances for that matter, makes me wish TP&TH had made more prominent use of that magic TP vs HE effect in the studio than they did.)
Good question! Thanks for asking
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^ Yeah, right?
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^^ Yeah, I'd all but forgotten about that one.. Really great stuff! Thanks for posting!
Petition: "Will Meet Again" for the live set! Sign your name!
in The Waiting
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Most of his image otherwise is focused on the human aspect. So, speaking for itself as it indeed may, "stale" or "robotic" (depending on view) seems like an odd type of "perfection" to me. All I ever argued for.
But yes. If a "they" slipped in there, I most certainly hope that from the rest of my ramblings you can see I agree this issue is all about TP, it's all in his head. (And as a side note - Im sure MC or BT could serve up some real perfection no matter what was going on. I bet they all could to some extent.) As always, my point is how painfully little is needed to achieve so much. But that's the whole ugly topic again. Here's to YAIWMA!