letstalkbeatles.com
John Lennon Forums => Lennon- Albums => Topic started by: Keri on March 22, 2015, 04:37:34 am
-
I like the title track, it's not genius but i think it's a pretty good single. But it's really the only song that i think is really good.
This album just seems imaginatively bankrupt, I'd take most of Ringo's albums over this one, I find John solo so frustrating, he was an intensely creative man, but he just wasn't exercising it. Makes me think of the Dadaists and surrealists that became hardline communists and their art died.
Anyone here love this one?
-
Not particularly....I've read that Lennon was particularly stung by the reception his previous album, "Some Time In New York City", and was determined to not do that one again. Title track is, as you said, a pretty good single, but not genius. I like "Tight A$", but more for the music than anything else. I also liked "Bring On the Lucie (Freda People)......not too much else outside of those. I will say that the remasters that were done in the early 2000's make "Mind Games" a much more listenable album....
-
I played this one a lot. I'm not sure why though. I liked it I guess. One of my "things" is to play something to death for a year and then not go back to it every again. :o I like Mind Games and Out of the Blue and a few others. One Day at a Time has the weirdest effect on the Drums though....something he did on a few other songs.
-
Sounds like a delay or extreme slap-back echo to me....JL loved that effect on his vox too.
-
The song Mind Games has such great vocals by John. Out Of The Blue is cool. All in all I am in with Keri on this. My thoughts exactly. John was stressed. He was stressed about the immigration situation, the Some Time in NYC album "failure", and stressed about his relationship with Yoko.
I have always thought this: John really had a small obsession with Whiter Shade of Pale, and I have always thought that the song Mind Games was always kind of a slower, troggy, descending-chord song that was consciously or sub-consciously influenced by that song. I have never found anyone to agree with that. I stand alone on this.
-
One thing I have read in numerous books was JL's tendency to write songs around one or two chords....this song's chorus is a good example. The "hook" is the same throughout all the chorus bits on this one. The bass changes it up enough to not be too noticeable.
I can see the similarities with "Whiter Shade" too....
-
I can see the similarities with "Whiter Shade" too....
Well that's pretty cool. Now that you pointed me in that direction..I totally see and hear that. Neat! ;D
-
Yeah there could be a touch of "whiter shade of pale" unfortunately i don't think john out did it with Mind Games, although as I say i like the song.
Doesn't seem to be that much love for this album.
I recently read Hunter Davies book of Lennon letters and I enjoyed it, it reminded me what an amazing man he was and what a lively mind he had & that's one of the reasons I find his solo work so frustrating, he had huge potential, but for me he just didn't deliver on it.
-
I brought up Whiter Shade because of that story of him with a record player in his car, and whoever told the story mentioned that Whiter Shade was the song they heard him play all the time on that car record-player. Might have been Shotton that told it.
-
Ian MacDonald in his book revolution in the head seemed to think that whiter Shade of Pale had a big impact on the Beatles. It has certainly been wrapped in the Beatles mystique for me. I've never listened to a Procol Harum album though, anyone like them/listened?
-
I haven't really. It's funny how many songs are inspired by a classical tune though. The organ in this sounds classical to me...apparently inspired by Bach. That made me think of other tunes that did the same thing. Because being one. All By Myself is another. Can you think of any others?
-
Didn't a Billy Joel tune match up to a Beethoven melody. It was on the "50's" album he made. Something about "...haven't seen you for the longest time."
-
It did....it was titled "The Longest Time". However, the one that was so similar to Beethoven was "This Night", which so heavily borrowed from Beethoven's Pathétique Sonata, Joel credited him as L. V. Beethoven! Billy actually has some great classical chops...
-
Oh yeah. Thanks.
He was also quite a ragtime player.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWH9iwtl9Q4 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWH9iwtl9Q4)
-
I agree with you all. The title track 'Mind Games' is superb, but the rest of the album falls short of the mark. Have never been able to get into the rest of it. Maybe I should put it on and give it another go.
-
Yeah do, let us know how you go, but I think the depths are just not there.
-
Yeah do, let us know how you go, but I think the depths are just not there.
Alas, my feelings for the album have not changed. The one other song that does resonate with me is 'I Know (I Know)', even if it does owe its riff to I've Got A Feeling. Overall, the album feels heavily derivative and very much second division Lennon material. I enjoy Some Time In NYC and Walls & Bridges a great deal more - even though they were not regarded amongst his finest work either.
And I'm not a fan of that slap-back echo sound he put on his drums and vocals at that time. It comes across as a cheap low-rent approximation of the Sun Studios sound. He may as well have used a tacky VST with Audacity! ;D