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On first listening, Joni Mitchell's 'Court And Spark,' the first truly great pop album of 1974, sounds surprisingly light by the third or fourth listening, it reveals its underlying tensions.

Jon Landau

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Jon Landau
Age: 77
Born: 1947
Born: May 14
Composer
Journalist
Music Critic
Record Producer
Talent Manager
the United States of America
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Tensions
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The greatness of Mac Rebennack, alias, Dr. John, also known as John Crieux, rests on his command of the musical use of idiomatic expression. Not a technically well-endowed singer, nor a great songwriter, he leaves his mark through the discipline and control he exerts over all that he touches.
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Elton John himself never seems pretentious but Bernie Taupin's lyrics often do - sometimes pretentious in a clever sort of way, but pretentious nonetheless. There is a conflict between Elton's and Bernie's personal styles, no doubt about it.
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It didn't matter that Charlie Chaplin may not have been a great director or a great anything else. He made great movies.
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Bob Dylan was the source of pop music's unpredictability in the Sixties. Never as big a record-seller as commonly imagined, his importance was first aesthetic and social, and then as an influence.
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'Sing It Again Rod' touches all the solo bases since Stewart's departure from the Jeff Beck Band, wherein he cut his teeth on American audiences for $75 a week plus expenses, and wisely ignores his generally inferior work with the Faces.
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Sly Stone doesn't make good albums: only good records. His style is so infinite and revolves around so many crucial aspects that it has only come together perfectly on a handful of his singles.
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There is something complete about Stevie Wonder, and one senses that he is not only exceptionally important today, but will continue to be for as long as he chooses.
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It is by now beyond question that Elton John is a competent and classy entertainer. Few people who have achieved his popularity have succeeded in maintaining his standards for performance and professionalism.
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One gets the impression that Elvis Presley does what his business advisors think will be most profitable. My advice to them: Put Elvis Presley in the studio with a bunch of good, contemporary rockers, lock the studio up, and tell him he can't come out until he's done made an album that rocks from beginning to end.
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Elton John can be a master of the sleight of hand. The arrangements make it seem like there are substantial melodies underneath the tracks - but almost nothing demands repeated listenings. Similarly, he always sounds like he's singing up a storm, but his voice glosses over the material, reducing most things to an uninteresting sameness.
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Since her landmark 'Tapestry,' Carole King has both oversimplified and over elaborated that masterful album's style until her music has become something more overtly but less effectively personal.
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'Call Me' is not an exceptional Al Green album, but it is as solid as a rock at its center.
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The Beatles never sounded intimidated by their idols. They never interpreted old rock they simply played it as well and as joyfully as they knew how. On 'Rock 'n' Roll,' John Lennon does nothing but interpret old rock.
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There is a 'patrician arrogance' to James Taylor that accounts in part for his popularity while it at the same time explains the critical resistance to his work.
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Carole King's second album, 'Tapestry,' has fulfilled the promise of her first and confirmed the fact that she is one of the most creative figures in all of pop music. It is an album of surpassing personal-intimacy and musical accomplishment and a work infused with a sense of artistic purpose. It is also easy to listen to and easy to enjoy.
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Everyone eventually winds up writing about themselves - the problem is finding the best way to go about it. To write about oneself literally, in the first person, presumes a more interesting personal life and philosophy than most rock lyricists possess. John Lennon was good for one great album based on musical direct address, 'Plastic Ono Band.
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My ambition was to be a record producer, and I had started doing that in the late '60s with my work with the MC5 and my friend Livingston Taylor.
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While the Beatles always had George Martin around to clean up their act, the Rolling Stones had Andrew Loog Oldham to coarsen theirs.
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The only criticism heard with any frequency of Elton John's first American album, 'Elton John,' was that the production was too grandiose. The melodies were superb, and lyrics frequently very good, and the performances flawless.
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The Rolling Stones have been the best of all possible worlds: they have the lack of pretension and sentimentality associated with the blues, the rawness and toughness of hard rock, and the depth which always makes you feel that they are in the midst of saying something. They have never impressed me as being kitsch.
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