1970s Phil Spector

[SMiLE Brian]

Anybody else think Spector's 1970s work with Dion, Leonard Cohen, and The Ramones is some of his best?

[halblaineisgood]

.

[SMiLE Brian]

These Dion tracks are great
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0dlPgCjzzU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06Hcz-wPz44

[Niko]

Do You Remember Rock and Roll Radio is my most listened to late-Spector track.

I had this on cassette as an 8-year old and I would carry it with me everywhere so I could put it in anything that played tapes I came across. Someone in my family probably ended up destroying that tape now that I think about.

[Mike's Beard]

Anybody else think Spector's 1970s work with Dion, Leonard Cohen, and The Ramones is some of his best?

Yes, Born to Be With You and Death of a Ladies Man are fantastic.

[JK]

Anybody else think Spector's 1970s work with Dion, Leonard Cohen, and The Ramones is some of his best?

Yes, Born to Be With You and Death of a Ladies Man are fantastic.

One man's meat...

I bought DoaLM because a review promised me swirling Spectorian strings and I thought the Spector connection might convert me to Cohen. Not so----one play was enough for me.

[phirnis]

I think All Things Must Pass is pretty great. Awaiting on You All is every bit as good as most of his 60s material.

As for the Dion and Leonard Cohen albums - bit boring if you ask me. I prefer Cohen the way he sounds on his first couple of records. Never heard End of the Century in all its entirety because I'm not a big Ramones fan. I do like Rock'n'Roll Radio, however. Talking about Spector's later work, does anyone actually like that Starsailor album he did a couple of songs on?

[Moon Dawg]

I think All Things Must Pass is pretty great. Awaiting on You All is every bit as good as most of his 60s material.

As for the Dion and Leonard Cohen albums - bit boring if you ask me. I prefer Cohen the way he sounds on his first couple of records. Never heard End of the Century in all its entirety because I'm not a big Ramones fan. I do like Rock'n'Roll Radio, however. Talking about Spector's later work, does anyone actually like that Starsailor album he did a couple of songs on?

  I thought "Silence Is Easy" was rather good, yes.

[Aum Bop Diddit]

John Lennon Plastic Ono Band is worth mentioning (co-producer actually).  Certainly sparer than a regular Spector production, but it has a *sound*.  And of course he was on hand for a number of John and George's (AND Yoko) solo albums.

[yonderhillside]

Anybody else think Spector's 1970s work with Dion, Leonard Cohen, and The Ramones is some of his best?

Yes. 

Death of a Ladies' Man is a shambling, drunken, recklessly beautiful album.

[kwan_dk]

Yep, I love the 70s Spector dirge-like sound. For me, it's every bit as good as and at times even better than his 60s productions.

Talking about Spector's later work, does anyone actually like that Starsailor album he did a couple of songs on?

He was only involved with two songs on that album, the fab title track and the more mellow White Dove - where I honestly don't really hear that much of a Spector influence. But Silence is Easy? Definately. Those chiming bells in the background that pop up two/thirds into the song for instance. Brilliant! I've heard though that the band had him tone down his original vision for the song quite a bit. I imagine that had he had his way completely there would have been a lot more Echo on there, more guitars strumming in unison, grand swooping strings etc. As much as I love the eventual outcome I would have loved to hear that version!

[Ron]

This may be the best place I can find to ask this...

"Unchained Melody", did Spector himself come up with the idea to slow it down?  I always thought so, and attributed that to his genius, but while driving around today listening to the oldies channel.... they played what sounded like a really, really old half instrumental, half choir-based song by somebody that had a similar, slow arrangement. 

[kwan_dk]

This may be the best place I can find to ask this...

"Unchained Melody", did Spector himself come up with the idea to slow it down?  I always thought so, and attributed that to his genius, but while driving around today listening to the oldies channel.... they played what sounded like a really, really old half instrumental, half choir-based song by somebody that had a similar, slow arrangement. 

There has actually been quite a lot of speculation about that track in that it sounds suspiciously sparse in comparison to some of the other Spector produced Righteous Brothers ballads (i.e. Ebb Tide, For Sentimental Reasons etc.) Allegedly, the track was produced by Bill Medley who was often allowed to flesh out the Righteous Brothers Philles albums with (in Spector's eyes) Medley-produced filler. So supposedly the track's sound is Medley's doing and he certainly was capable of hitting the Wall of Sound spot-on if you listen to some of their later Work, especially Soul & Inspiration. Bill Medley even claims himself to have produced it in this recent interview after having stayed silent about it for many years:

"I happened to produce Unchained Melody; I know a lot of people think Phil (Spector) did it but I produced and arranged it. I had the arrangement all done and Bobby came in and sang it twice and that was it. I played piano and sang vocal background on it. Unchained Melody was supposed to be the B-side of Hung on You and if I knew that it was gonna be a hit I certainly would have brought in a better piano player. (laughs)"
http://www.rockcellarmagazine.com/2014/05/06/soul-inspiration-a-conversation-with-bill-medley-of-the-righteous-brothers/#sthash.Plrpgcpt.dpbs

[Ron]

Interesting.  I just listened to the original... the song was always slow from the beginning.  The cool choir/instrumental version I heard the other day was recorded soon after it was written, in 1955. 

Up until that I'd never heard anything but the famous Righteous Brothers version, and what I had assumed to be the original, the Vito & the Salutations awesome uptempto Doo Wop version. 

So anyways, all that to say that since I now believe Medley produced it, it leaves my image of Spector as a genius intact