I was walking around listening to my iPod and Carly Simon’s “That’s The Way I Always Heard It Should Be” just knocked me for a loop - brilliant, utterly genius, songwriting. But it reminded me that I haven’t paid any attention to her later career, and made me think that there could be equally great songs buried on her many later albums.
I’m a big Todd Rundgren fan, and a few years back he released “Liars”, the best album he’s done in 20+ years, and a lot better than many of the albums he released in his 1970s heyday. But after a particular point in an artist’s career, the radio stations, and even the audience figures they have an artist comfortably pigeonholed - Todd is “Hello It’s Me” and even (shudder!) “Bang On The Drum All Day”, in spite of producing a huge amount of music in a wide variety of styles.
So, what song and albums have been created by artists “past their prime” that are as good as, or better than, the stuff they produced in their “prime”?
Sure, but that is just re-visiting material from one’s glory days. Todd did that with his album “With A Twist” covering his hits in Bossa Nova style. I’m more curious about what really great songs may be buried on albums that only big fans that keep buying long after the public and mass media has decided they are no longer relevant. For instance, Janis Ian is known for one song, “At Seventeen” - but she’s recorded 25 albums. Are there good songs on any of those later albums?
Richard Thompson, who just turned 60 this year, released the awesome Sweet Warrior in '07, most noted for the Iraq war protest song, “Dad’s Gonna Kill Me.” Although personally, my favorite of his is from '99, Mock Tudor. For many, his peak was his last album with Linda, Shoot Out the Lights, in '82.
In 2002, the Sparks released a wholly entertaining album in Lil’ Beethoven. The album cover was rubbish, but the songs were funny, clever and had an untraditional song structure. The overall quality was, I think, definitinely on par with the best albums of the 70’s, albeit with a different sound - which just shows that the Sparks have evolved as artists, so good on them.
I don’t know if Clapton ever disappeared from the public eye though. I’m curious about artists who the public would tend to say “are they still alive?” Jill Soboule self-released and financed her last album entirely with fan donations, but who knows anything she’s done apart from “I Kissed A Girl”? Nena has released a whole series of albums, but who knows anything other than “99 Luftballoons”?
I’ll nominate recent work by Neil Young and Rush. Both acts older than Canadian Praire dust, yet both have some decent, recent stuff.
Of course Mr. Young is one of a few actual musical geniuses alive today in my opinion. I don’t always like what he does, but like Paul Simon (who I like very little, but respect alot) consistantly amazes.
That’s what I mean. Who knows what they’ve been doing other than something like “Eaten By The Monster of Love”? I’ve read reviews, but never got around to picking anything up.
Not something she put out last month or anything, but she did the main theme song, “Let the River Run”, to Working Girl (1988) — quite a long time after “That’s The Way I Always Heard It Should Be”.
Sorry, but that song doesn’t exist for me because it won the Oscar over Jevetta Steele’s vastly superior “Calling You”. Academy voters chose Carly’s song because they knew the name, not because they had heard both songs. And they didn’t have the songs performed that year at the Oscars, so the injustice went unnoticed.
I just got the new Trashcan Sinatras album IN THE MUSIC ironically enough it features a Carly Simon cameo on the song SHOULD I PRAY…great stuff-and the album is really terrific… love those guys.
I also went back and took a listen at my Carly catalogue and found loads of great songs never heard on the radio.
Just Not True
Slave
We’re So Close
It Happens Everday
and her 2007 release INTO WHITE is really amazing—
I also found a 1976 LIVE concert performance of ELO at Wolfgang’s Vault–
The sound quality is A+
it’s amazing stuff like this is around!
Bruce Springsteen had a long run of mediocre-at-best releases after Born in the USA. The Rising came 18 years later, after 4 studio releases and a number of compilations and live recordings. Maybe it’s partly because of my personal experiences during the 9/11 attacks and aftermath, but I can’t listen to this record without getting emotional.
Glad to know that. I almost bought it, but then I saw her on a talk show where she was promoting the CD . She sang You’re So Vain newly arranged to suit her (more limited) vocal range. Man, I really like Carly Simon and I hate to say it, but the her voice was just not up to it. Maybe she was just having a bad day.
Bob Dylan is 68 and I think his latest Together Through Life is pretty darn good – bluesy, cynical, and a great fit for his voice. This is the first album I’ve heard from him in a while that I’ve really enjoyed.
Seriously though…Springsteen? Clapton? Neil Young? Dylan? Have these megastars ever been out of the public eye? Some of their albums have sold more, some less, but they haven’t been dropped from their labels, haven’t retreated to selling their albums by mail.
Sparks is a great example though - they were known for a medium-sized hit or two, then spent the next couple of decades toiling in radio obscurity. Richard Thompson is another - one critically acclaimed album, then it seemed like nothing else he did would ever catch their attention again.
For instance, my favorite Thomas Dolby album is Astronauts and Heretics, and is is his lowest selling - he wound up quitting recording and concentrating on developing software for the web and mobile phones. How many people know anything he’s done apart from “She Blinded Me With Science”?
While they’re not ready for the old folk’s home yet, I nominate late 90s one hit wonder Fastball. Everyone knows and loves “The Way”, but they just put out a new album called Little White Lies and it is fantastic. It’s just a fun little CD and a nice reminder of just how good 90s-style rock can be.
Echo and the Bunnymen’s What Are You Going to Do With Your Life was released in 1999 and doesn’t have a bad track on it. I don’t listen to it as much as their eponymous 1987 album (which contained their last big hit), but I do listen to it more than their Best Ofs (it’s one of those bands that I like the deeper cuts better.)
