We Built This City [On Rock an' Roll]

btw get ready y'all: we're doing a Rod Stewart listening thread next week.

His whole career?

I like some early Rod, but no matter how bad any other 60s/70s star got in their later years, I guarantee he got worse. The store I used to work in played those damn Great American Songbook CDs in the mornings when the clientele was mainly senior citizens, and those albums are pure evil.

What if Rod Stewart had died in 1976...

no matter how bad any other 60s/70s star got in their later years, I guarantee he got worse

Roger Daltrey
Pete Townshend
CSN
The Beach Boys

Stewart wins.

Rod Stewart's worst 80s hit is better than anything the Faces ever recorded. Christ, what an inexplicably beloved pile that band was.

looking forward to the Rod thread, I don't think I know any of his songs aside from Sailing, Da Ya Think I'm Sexy? and Young Turks (I like the second two and find the first unbearable which always made me doubt the "he used to be good then he totally lost it" narrative - but I've just looked and Sailing is on Atlantic Crossing which is supposed to be the beginning of the critically unacclaimed years, so maybe isn't representative of early Rod as I'd always assumed?)

Roger Daltrey
Pete Townshend
CSN
The Beach Boys

Stewart wins.

― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, September 1, 2016 2:38 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'll take Endless Wire over Rod's The Great American Songbook Christmas Kidz Bop And What The Hell It's Almost Halloween, I Think part MCMVLXXXIII any day.

And Pete's playing now is light years beyond Rod's current voice (or anyone else's playing, for that matter).

We Built This City is a great single imo. I love the story that various radio stations in the US replaced the spoken word "the city by the bay" DJ spiel bit with a different spoken word spiel about their own city/radio station, are there any other hits that were similarly adapted?

Can't comment on Endless Wire but Rod's voice on those Songbook records is a menace. He seems to think that baby-talk is the same thing as crooning.

xxxpost:

All the good stuff is pre-Atlantic Crossing. His solo albums fro 1969-1974, plus everything he did with Faces, plus 'In a Broken Dream' = his best work.

no complaints on the Suckbook material, for which he has no affinity, philosophical or musical.

We Built This City is a great single imo. I love the story that various radio stations in the US replaced the spoken word "the city by the bay" DJ spiel bit with a different spoken word spiel about their own city/radio station, are there any other hits that were similarly adapted?

― corbynite, shite (soref), Thursday, September 1, 2016 2:50 PM (two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

On the Pointer Sisters' "Fire" they overdubbed radio station call letters so that the line "I turn on the radio" was changed to (in Chicago) "I turn on WLS."

All the good stuff is pre-Atlantic Crossing. His solo albums fro 1969-1974, plus everything he did with Faces, plus 'In a Broken Dream' = his best work.

― the hair - it's lost its energy (Turrican),

No denying it but like we did with the Eagles we want to see how those late '70s albums hold up. I don't have any problem with Footloose and Fancy Free and A Night on the Town.

Oh, I'll be keeping an eye on the thread to see if anyone turns up any kind of forgotten gem.

We Built This City is a great single imo. I love the story that various radio stations in the US replaced the spoken word "the city by the bay" DJ spiel bit with a different spoken word spiel about their own city/radio station, are there any other hits that were similarly adapted?

Huey Lewis and the News did this for "The Heart of Rock and Roll." Maybe it's a mainstream SF thing.

xxpost:

Oh yeah, and the first two Jeff Beck Group LP's too... those can go on the "peak Rod" pile.

Also, anyone praising this song still as being 'great' is somehow defective, and I reserve the right to rip out your eardrums. I do this to save you from yourself, no need to thank me.

Second Jeff Beck Group record is meh, and the absence of Mickey Waller is largely why.

Truth is obviously all-time, and Zep wouldn't exist without it.

xp

The most offensive thing about "We Built This City" are Grace Slick's clothes on the single cover.

wtf are you talking about, her look is awesome!

Are "someone stole the stage" and "who rides the wrecking ball into our guitars?" supposed to be the lines that complain about techno pop? Like, I'm not even totally sure that this was unintended:

I hear unintended compositional irony: The song validates synclaviers as worthwhile foundation stones in this city of rock 'n' roll.

I meant musically.

Ha, so it was the guitarist from the band who was saying they were complaining? I'll defer to him then.

Another candidate (one I can support) is nominated.

Meanwhile in England...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GenPArDAdls

We Built This New Town (On Smack and Dole)

"The guitarist from the band" is Craig Chaqico and he was a total guitar stud from the day he joined JS as a 17 year old.

and I probably spelled his name wrong

He also seems to think that Guglielmo Marconi would have played or even listened to 'mamba' so I'm beginning to question my deference to his interpretation of the lyrical message.

Like, what I was trying to say earlier was that, before reading the article, I did not really think of the song as trying to make an anti-synth statement, ironic or otherwise. Did any psychedelic band explicitly object to synthesizers or electronic music technology in the 60s? (I know that some hard rock bands did later from the mid-70s onwards.)

Did any psychedelic band explicitly object to synthesizers or electronic music technology in the 60s?

No way, man, because in the '60s synths and electronic music were still totally far out and anti-establishment.

http://moreorlessbunk.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/tumblr_mjart3dSfz1qzhoqfo1_1280-1-2.jpg

^ Aw, sticking it to "The Man" with bleepy synths. How quaint.

yeah psych rocker attitude towards synths in the late 60s was probably like "whoa far out, man, look at all those wires.. listen to that shit, man, wow, groovy, where can i buy one?"

magic alex!

i could imagine jorma and jack from JA being hesitant about synths, though... just because for all their acid fried otherworldly shredding.. they had a pretty trad blues/folk background, iirc. i know they were taken aback seeing the Who destroy instruments on stage ("your guitar... that's a sacred totem, man, you gotta respect your instrument"). lots of weird noises all over airplane records, though.

I think the technology for early synths was so rare and studio time so precious that coming across them was probably quite novel.

To me the band that seemed to make a big deal about not using synths was Queen.

The big deal in Queen's case was less anti tech and more "No really, Brian May's guitar does sound like that!"

had no idea Mickey Thomas got attacked by a bandmate in a bar and that's why he needed facial reconstruction surgery.

omg this video

lol at him singing at Lincoln Memorial about to cry. i haven't seen this since i was 5

man I had no idea Grace Slick was 47 at the time

still looked and sounded vibrant as hell. that's why of the Starship material I prefer the cheesy "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now". her voice is still sexy and powerful as hell on that, where it has no utility on We Built This City given how low in her register she has to sing it.

plus also Mannequin video lol

Everyone deserves a pop hit in their 47th year.

can't wait for my single about the Trump presidency to drop in 2028

“We Built This City” was written and recorded in stages, by an assembly line of songwriters. (Cancer, too, develops in stages.)

Fuck off, Rob Tannenbaum.

i am listening to this song right now and i like it

that "Planes" vid upthread is fucking hilarious

The song came on while I was eating at Taco Bell and it made the fact I was eating Taco Bell even more depressing.

We built this city on Taco Bell

Ma Coley drops the chalupa

Grace Slick = oldest woman to have a number one single, except for Cher ("Believe")