"The Great American Songbook" impact on the charts

[chessparov]

Standards seem to be back with a vengence.
Rod Stewart, Michael Buble, Norah Jones, Diana Krall, et al are selling millions of records with this material. In fact Rod is going to put out a Volume 3.

With Kevin Spacey is taking the lead role in his
20 million dollar biopic on the late great Bobby Darin due later this year, I expect this phenomenon to further mushroom.

Are any of you involved with this genre right now or are planning to do so in the future?

Thoughts and comments are welcomed.

Chris

[chessparov]

Please excuse the poor editing of my last post!
(With Kevin Spacey IS...)

Chris

[thethrillfactor]

Originally posted by chessparov
Standards seem to be back with a vengence.
Rod Stewart, Michael Buble, Norah Jones, Diana Krall, et al are selling millions of records with this material. In fact Rod is going to put out a Volume 3.

With Kevin Spacey is taking the lead role in his
20 million dollar biopic on the late great Bobby Darin due later this year, I expect this phenomenon to further mushroom.

Are any of you involved with this genre right now or are planning to do so in the future?

Thoughts and comments are welcomed.

Chris

Its a funny thing you mentioned here.

A couple of years ago, people were sampling other styles of music and slapping their own lyrics to it. They got lambasted for not being original and just making bucks of the original's fame(can we say Puffy Combs).

Now if someone supposedly new comes along and rehashes the "standards" its heralded as being a great idea(like it hasn't been done before a million times).

Instead of rewarding people for doing interpretations of the same old boring standards, how about stepping out and doing something original or experimental?

I know who wants to take the risks?

But as they say"without great risks, there are no great rewards".

To answer your original question, for me personally the answer is no. If i were to do a remake i probably pick something cool and obscure from the 80's. Maybe something like Talk Talk's "Life is what you make it" or something from the Cure.

[natpub]

While I agree that the "Fake Book" tunes will always be powerful, I cannot, in good conscience, ignore the current power of a song like "Hey Ya" or "Megalomaniac." My point being, not that modern music is any better, but that "original" music will always contain a ticking time-bomb of interest and success.

From an artist point of view, this rather reminds me of the current rash of Rembrant wannabe's, stuffing the galleries with Neo-realism.

Surely there is a nitch market for things like Rod Stewart trying to appeal to his last-gasping fans, but I am not quite sure what it has to do with art. Nostalgia, perhaps. Pity, probably...Not to be mean, but the Rod stuff really sucks ass. I feel bad about his operation, glad for his cancer survival, and realistic that his voice is shot, energy gone, spirit ready to move into the next realm. He has given great things, they are now gone. He ain't Ole' Blue Eyes.

I am all for revival. And I am well aware that the median age of the Western nations is rapidly increasing. Hell, I myself am tilting my marketing a little older. 30-40-somethings have tons o cash, and now feel younger than ever. I much prefer to sell to them than the 16 year-old chick. Mid-life folk have computers and plenty of desire. However, they still cling to what they used to love.

With that in mind, perhaps a revival of stuff like "Queen" is in order :-)

Going all the way back to "Fake Book" standards may feel cool, but it isnt for me to compete with the after-market TV "infomercial"
powers-that-be. They have too much ability to squash me. I will stick to making something newer.

I will add, Nora Jones and Rod Stewart have NOTHING in common, regardless of the source material or inspiration.


Affectionately bemused,

kt

P.S the RS stuff isnt "on the charts." It has no airplay, it is an "infomercial" phenomenon. I can only guess at the net profit after that kind of marketing splurge.

PPS - remind me to check out the price of infomercials!

[Hans Hitmachine]

I agree with Rod Stuart's sucking.
But to me those standards were the best songs ever written in pop history.
Extremely logical sounding, but at the same time very challenging in terms of composing techniques.
And lyricly top notch. Why? Because it had nothing to do with the Vietnam war or your deepest feelings of selfdestruction etc. Cut the crap!
It was about slow boats to china, autmn leaves, tea for two and one more for the road, heel make it a double.
Everyone knows what they're about and the flow is just utterly amazing. great lines and rhymes.
Something the shizzlemenizzle d.o double jizzleforsnizzles could learn from.
I think Robbie Williams swing album was quite good. But it was too much Sinatra on some pieces (same orchestrations etc.) But when the voice is good all you have to do is sing them without the cliché crap of the "airy-voice is condition" etc. Of course the silk suits and cigarets are part of the picture and you can't do without them. It just makes it cooler. 'But most people aren't very credible that way, you have to be cool, like I am

[natpub]

No one questioned, lest of all I, the mastery of those tunes.
They are not, nor will they be coming back in their old form. Sure, the tide ebbs and flows, but we are here now, having learned from those gods of composition, and I would hate to see it be re-hashed in some copy.

peace,

kt

[Hans Hitmachine]

I totally agree. That's why it's so cool what Norah Jones did.
It's hard to find a good way of performing those songs. Without becomming a cliché OR....too hip/modern sounding: "Fly me to-t--tttooo the m--m-m -zwkwkwz-moon, holla oh-oooh!!!
Somehow you have to walk the thin line between those two which is very difficult. View succeed, but if.....it's lovely as always, because the music is so great.
Most important is that you're truly passionate about these songs, which are in heart, timeless.
But I do actually believe that the crooner/ jazz image can be part of it without getting too cheezy. Tom Waits is a good example. He sang mostly own songs, but "Heart of Saterday night" could have been a jazz standard album with lots of the clichés but yet credible. But most of the time it's just polished, semi old fashioned poop.

[Hans Hitmachine]

I meant "by heart".....I suppose

[ozraves]

To a large extent, music (pop music, especially jazz) is about being an historical re-creator. To my mind, Wynton Marsalis has a lot more in common with the guys who put on Civil War soldier costumes and go out and play on the weekends reliving old battles than he does Miles Davis, John Coltrane, or Ornette Coleman.

[chessparov]

Thanks for the all the interesting comments.

With all due respect, it's funny how other musical genres like opera, jazz, and blues are more tolerant of continuing to perform established material than the "pop" audience-particularly those who contribute by making contemporary style records.

Less of a "stretch" for opera fans to witness Pavoratti as the lead in La Boheme than hearing Rod crooning, for example.

Imaginative re-recordings of standards like "Summertime"
(Billy Stewart), and "Try a Little Tenderness" (Otis Redding)
are very cool in my book.

Chris

P.S. I think one of the benefits of this genre is you can hook up
with a pianist, or a small combo vs. dealing with the typical
rock band personnel "issues" such as musical competency.

[jdier]

I love the old standards, but I do not think any of these wanker recording them now are doing anything that Ella, Billie, Frank and gang didn't do better.

I do not mind when a someone does a track for a sound track or something like that (the harry met sally stuff) but to just churn out albums of mediocre versions of great songs is just crap.

[chessparov]

Sorry if the intent of my thread wasn't clear.

It was to discuss the reality of this genre becoming more and more of a factor with buyers
instead of the merit (or lack thereof) in various
current artist CD releases.

Like how Country Music made a big comeback a while back with the general public.

Still appreciate all the posted contributions though!

Chris

[ozraves]

There was a great quote by Robert Fripp once about how Classic guitar literature was anachronistic and that one chord by Hendrix meant so much more to him. I love Hendrix but in 2004 we can say the same thing about Hendrix as Fripp said about Classic guitar.

[Dave Martin]

I tend to disagree that anyone who records new versions of old songs is a 'wanker' (though Rod Stewart's record is atrociously bad); if you look back you'l see that many of Norman Grantz's artists, to give one example, worked from what was essentially the same repertoire. For another example, Ella, Louis Armstrong and Bobby Darin ALL recorded Mack The Knife, and all are great.

And I must say that from the view point of lyric, melody and harmonic information, I find that most of the songs from the 30's through the 50's are far better than the mindless drivel recorded now. Where are the current Cole Porters, Jummy Van Heusens, or Lorenz Harts? Certainly, they're not being played on pop radio.

One very exciting thing about standards records is that there's a certain levelling of the field; you get to hear what the singer actually does with a song that you already know. For example, while I think that a singer ought to approach the sensuality of Peggy Lee if she records "Fever", I woudn't want to hear a young singer trying to mimic Peggy's performance - I want to hear what sensibilities a new singer brings to the song.

And from a Gear Slut's perspective, I think that making a great pop standards record (the way that they should be made) is a lot more challenging (and a hell of a lot more fun) than endless rounds of overdubbing and editing to try to create a useable performance rom a mediocre talent.

[jdier]

Great points on leveling the field Dave!

[ozraves]

Originally posted by Dave Martin
Where are the current Cole Porters, Jummy Van Heusens, or Lorenz Harts?

I agree with the sentiment. It's kind of like where the current Charlie Yardbird Parker, the current Beethoven, the current Stockhausen (yeah, he's still alive but not anything of what he was before I was born), the current Buddy Holly...

[Bob Olhsson]

Originally posted by Dave Martin
.... Where are the current Cole Porters, Jummy Van Heusens, or Lorenz Harts? Certainly, they're not being played on pop radio.

It was a very different world. First off. it was almost unheard of for performers to write their own material. Second, Broadway was booming so a good writer could earn a great deal from just co-writing one show. It was a full time profession on a scale that hasn't been seen since the early 1950s.

Radio stations were not allowed to play records so they were always looking for ways of presenting music without having to pay musicians. A common method was doing live broadcasts from hotels. The hotel and the band would allow a station or network to broadcast their gigs in return for mentioning the hotel and the band's names. The band leaders controlled what music they played so song pluggers would pitch lots of music to them. A leader could make a song and with it themselves very popular. A lot more music and songwriters got exposed and the intense competition led to amazing quality.

[joeq]

I think these standards albums are kind of like Christmas albums. Its sort of obligitory for a certain kind of artist to put them out. There's that 'lets hear how _this artist handles this song' thing Dave Martin pointed out. Its a yardstick for the measurement of the singer's chops, taste, and talent. That's why they call them Standards.

Its also like a Christmas album because it is a guaranteed revenue stream for any artist with a name recognition factor.

For me personally, well, I played in a vocally oriented swing band for 12 years. While intellectually I appreciate how well crafted these songs were, I have to say if I never heard another standard again, that would be OK with me.

[picksail]

Nostalgia still sucks.

[Hans Hitmachine]

"A lot more music and songwriters got exposed and the intense competition led to amazing quality". True! Same speaks for the Tin Pan Alley songwriters. Like Robbie Robertson stated: "a songwriter was the lowest on the totumpawl", the HAD to make good songs to survive.
"Nostalgia still sucks".....I don't totally agree. It can suck and it does in many cases, but it's still part of the music.
I don't want classical performers to play in jeans and ragged shirts and I want a blues player to sit in a rockin' chair. It goes with the picture. It doesn't really matter if it's old....to me at least. Making music is just like making a movie. It doesn't have to be about yourselve or true to real life, but it shouldn't be over the top.

[Dave Martin]

Originally posted by picksail
Nostalgia still sucks.

It's not about nostalgia - it's about finding the best vehicle for an artist's personal expression. For some folks, that means that they will write the songs that they'll perform - for others, its a matter of lending their own feelings to songs that have been done before.

(Curmudgeon mode on) Though you woudn't know it by listening to commercial radio, some folks (including me) prefer to hear melody, and words put together in a coherent fashion. Some days, I'm of the opinion that the Beatles were possibly that WORST thing that could hav happened to pop music. Why? ecause it gave artists the impresson that they, too, could write their own material. and we've had 40 years of mostly bad pop and rock songs because of it. (Curmudgeon mode off).

When I need wiring done, I hire a professional electrician - when my car needs work, I take it to a professional mechanic. Why shouldn't I look for a professional songwriter to get the best material I can find?

[joeq]

Originally posted by Dave Martin
. Why shouldn't I look for a professional songwriter to get the best material I can find?

because then you'd have to split the money with him.

[Hans Hitmachine]

I can't agree more.

All these kids are bitchin' about people like Sinatra or Elvis not writing their own music. It's a crime nowadays to sing other persons tunes. and that's why music sucks....