Re: the Goo Goo Dolls: I sort of agree that Iris was the point where they turned. However, Dizzy Up The Girl itself isn’t really that bad of an album - it’s pretty well written and instrumentally very good, even if it’s nowhere near the amazing sound that they had originally. The stuff they’ve released since then, though, has been not-especially-inspired pop-rock tripe. Maybe that just highlights the “turning” even more, though - once they got locked into that sound they didn’t have what made them great to begin with.
I haven’t heard hers and wasn’t a fan of her anyway, but there’s a version by the Magnetic Fields that I like: free amazon download
Seeing the Goo Goo Dolls mentioned in this thread, I feel compelled to note that, despite what you might have glimpsed on the Internet, drummer Mike Malinin was NEVER a member of Minor Threat.
The Doobie Brothers - ‘round the time they decided to get rid of the rockin’ “China Grove” singer and hire the wussoid “What a Fool Believes” singer.
mm
I’m dragging this thread back up just to ask a question of the people who brought up the Goo Goo Dolls. I might actually check out their early stuff, but I’ve heard that they were derogatory of The Replacements. So, if I already like the Replacements, would the Goo Goo Dolls’ early stuff still be good?
Paul Westerberg liked the Goo Goo Dolls enough to contribute lyrics to their song “We Are The Normal,” so I can’t imagine they were derogatory.
Did you mean “derivative”? Because, yes, that is a charge that has long been leveled at them, one that they probably wouldn’t bother denying.
Derogatory or derivative? I’m thinking, who cares what the Goo Goo Dolls think of the Replacements?
Yeah, everything I’ve ever heard of the Goo Goo Dolls sounds eerily like the Replacements (a band that never turned bad). But the songwriting wasn’t nearly as clever, so hearing the Goo Goo Dolls just makes me miss the Replacements.
Actually, the Goo Goo Dolls are probably a pretty good simulator for what might have been, had the Replacements ever started to suck.
[initech proudly notes the lack of “Goos” and “'Matts” in his post. Damn! Almost made it…]
The Steve Miller Band: “The Joker” Miller actually had deteriorated before that (with the albums “Rock Love”), but “The Joker” marked the change from a bunch of top-notch rock songs (“Living in the USA,” “Space Cowboy,” “Your Saving Grace,” “Little Girl,” “Goin’ to Mexico”) to a bunch of mindless, derivative bubblegum songs, with stolen riffs and cloying choruses.
Indeed, but YES itself hardly considers this Rabin-washed era to be real YES. And they have been trying really hard since 1996 to get back to their old 70s progressive sound using their (mostly) classic lineup.
So I think the band would say that ‘going bad’ was something that happened to them, rather than a result of their own selling out…
I totally agree! Side 2 of Sailor is one of the most perfectly realized pieces of vinyl in the history of rock 'n roll. Of course it helped tremendously that Miller had Boz Scaggs as a bandmate and co-songwriter. How the man who gave us Children of the Future, Sailor and Brave New World descended into the banality of “Fly Like an Eagle,” “Take the Money and Run” and “Abracadabra” is one of rock’s saddest and most mystifying tales.
Those who are unfamiliar with the Steve Miller Band from 1968-1970 are strongly urged to check out the five albums made during that time. You’ll be amazed.
That’s exactly right–they’ve been trying really hard. The problem is, it sounds like they’re trying really hard. Close to the Edge came on like a force of nature; Keys to Ascension came on like “Let’s make a Yes-type record.” Even though some of the newer stuff, like “Mind Drive,” is really pretty good, there’s a regrettably contrived feeling to it.
So true. But I love Magnification – part prog, part elevator music, but the most original thing they have done since Drama (I like that one too by the way, even without Anderson).
Sadly, my favorite, Recall the Beginning…A Journey From Eden, has never been released as a CD.
The Yardbirds. “For Your Love.” It was one of the reasons Eric Clapton quit the band.
Personally, I think that getting away from her cloying, sensitive-folkie sound was the best thing Jewel ever did.
I always thought that “Start Me Up” served as both the last great Stones song and the point at which they had officially run out of ideas.
David Bowie tanked when he jumped on the disco bandwagon with Fame. He seemed to have lost his edge, his hunger.
Same with the Stones and Miss You, or **Blondie ** with *Heart of * Glass.
To each their own, certainly. But “Intuition” is such a 180 from the songs that had brought her success that it seems like a slap in the face to anyone who’s NOT a “teen idol.”
Especially when they allowed Microsoft to use it.
I may be in the minority here, but I always thought “We Didn’t Start The Fire” was a pretty good song. Nothing really wrong with “Jump” either, though it has a rather dated sound. Or was this just a “pick on the 80s” riff?
As for naming Styx’s “Mr. Roboto”… Isn’t that basically their only remotely good song? The only other songs by Styx I can think of (based on Classic Rock radio playlists anyway) are “Come Sail Away” and “Lady”, both of which I find pretty unbearable.
The Simpsons saw fit to make fun of the last one too, in their parody of “The Odyssey of Homer”, where Odysseus (Homer) must cross the River Styx, only to find the banks crowded with skeletal figures playing air guitar and waving lighters to the song “Lady”. Oh God, this truly is Hell!
I think we’re getting a little away from the original point of this thread, which was when bands started selling out, not just jumping the overused shark.