In Praise of Moody Midtempo AOR

you guys would all really like the westerman album

“Waiting for a girl like you” is honestly top 10 all time for me

eminence front always struck me as more “sleeves rolled up” muscular daytime AOR

wasn’t that destroyer album kaput all about this vibe? too bad about dude’s voice.

“Bringing’ on the Heartache” and “Hysteria” bring this vibe to a mostly empty strip club.

This is perhaps one of my favorite genres of music, and all of my faves have already been named.

I count "Stayin' Alive" around 104 bpm fwiw.

at least based on this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fNFzfwLM72c

"Just What I Needed" and "Satisfaction" are in the high 120s/low 130s, a lot of ballads are around the low 70s. "Mid-tempo" seems right for the neighbourhood of 100 bpm.

I mean, by v rough counting, not loading tracks into a DAW or anything

Has this one been posted yet, re: the Bee Gees?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZY9oYSSjFI

The first time I head that one, we were living with two tweakers, and one of them played this really loud on the living room speakers, and I rushed out of my room to see what it was, and it is perhaps the only good thing that came out of that whole period of my life.

Bit offbeat here but Kraftwerk's The Model kind of fits

Sorry I misremembered on "Staying Alive" as the ur-tempo. On further looking, it and "Dancing Queen" are in the low hundreds.

120 is "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun."

I hang my head in shame

Dana donahue - “Casablanca”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BuGl1NcHbQ

You all heard of Seahawks? Their early stuff was all amazing spacey edits of this kind of stuff. Check out secrets of the deep and ocean trippin

Bit offbeat here but Kraftwerk's The Model kind of fits

I don’t know why I called it crunk, fp me

If John Stewart "Gold" fits, how about Gerry Rafferty's 1979 "Get It Right the Next Time":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXW-sL5gzHQ

Some other 1979-1980 tracks with (pick all that apply): steady drive, a little drama, keyboard swirls, tension, late night vibes, a little extra reverb.

Blondie - Union City Blue, Shayla, Do the Dark
Bob Dylan - I Believe in You
David Bowie - Fantastic Voyage, Look Back in Anger
Elvis Costello - (What's So Funny 'Bout) Peace, Love and Understanding
Fleetwood Mac - Tusk (still my choice for the weirdest Top 10 hit of the '70s)
Led Zeppelin - In the Evening
Marianne Faithfull - Broken English, Witches' Song
Patti Smith - Frederick
The Roches - Hammond Song, Losing True (unearthly harmonies with a sprinkling of Fripp)
Supertramp - Take the Long Way Home (maybe?)
Paul McCartney & Wings - Arrow Through Me
The B-52s - Dirty Back Road
David Bowie - Up the Hill Backward
Elvis Costello - Riot Act
John & Yoko - Every Man Has a Woman Who Loves Him
Peter Gabriel - No Self Control
Pretenders - Lovers of Today, Mystery Achievement, Porcelain
Rolling Stones - Emotional Rescue
Roxy Music - My Only Love
Steve Winwood - While You See a Chance or others from the Arc of a Diver album
U2 - An Cat Dubh/Into the Heart
Warren Zevon - Jungle Work

that list made me think of Marshall Hain's "Dancing In The City", from 1978. It's moody alright, but probably too breezy. More British yacht rock if anything I guess.

I'm still not 100% sure what the criteria is but I'll contribute Walter Egan - "Magnet And Steel"

At the core of Josh’s first examples and “You Belong to the City” is a kind of masculine grieving from someone who can’t emote through a full-on ballad and so maintains the mid-tempo and the rock groove. Maybe that’s why “With or Without You” doesn’t fit: it’s too open with its feelings.

"You Belong to the City" feels like a song you blast in your sports car en route to a drug deal.

Classic

Bill laBounty - livin it up

It Keeps you running - doobie brothers

I always assumed this song was about coke until I saw the verse lyrics. Just another love song

Drug deal, on the way to schtup someone who Isn’t your wife, something illicit like that.

I kinda get this vibe from the two big Robert Cray songs, minus the synths

a kind of masculine grieving from someone who can’t emote through a full-on ballad and so maintains the mid-tempo and the rock groove

brilliant description

figured Iggy pop would have one of these but can't quite find it - cry for love is really close but probably a bit too uptempo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI9vzh7CZIw

if you ran the numbers I also reckon a lot of these would feature some variation on Am-F-Am-F chord progression in the verses (is that i-IV?)

Fleetwood Mac - Mystified
Richard & Linda Thompson - Walking on a Wire
Most of Springsteen's "Tunnel of Love"

^ Tunnel is great but might be a little too...romantic? And the singles are uptempo

Bruce Hornsby - mandolin rain

Iggy's The Passenger fits in spirit but it's a little too rocking. Maybe something from The Idiot?

That description posted above is indeed a pretty brilliant encapsulation of this ethos!

Certainly female equivalents are fewer and far between, though I did post that Motels song "Only the Lonely," which fits perfectly. And "Self Control."

bruce’s voice is maybe a little too ragged for this thread, but “i’m on fire” and “one step up” totally fit imo

Xxxp

I was thinking “Tougher Than the Rest” and “One Step Up” but I agree there are some jumpier numbers that don’t fit.

Has anyone posted this article on AOR?

https://www.loudersound.com/features/inside-aor-the-most-under-appreciated-sub-genre-of-all-time

Icehouse's whole shtick was something akin to this, but having set out from the direction of new wave/synth pop rather than more authentic manly rock strains (LOL) they may be ever so slightly too, er, icy here. Moodiness, synths and frequent saxophone though...

eg.
Don't Believe Any More
Hey Little Girl
No Promises

They're massively indebted to Roxy Music, who imo don't really fit. *Too* cold and/romantic, at least the later stuff that fits closest.

does Journey – Who's Crying Now qualify?

― real muthaphuckkin jeez (crüt), Wednesday, December 2, 2020 3:49 PM (three days ago)

Running With the Night by Lionel Ritchie?

― Blues Guitar Solo Heatmap (Free Download) (upper mississippi sh@kedown), Wednesday, December 2, 2020 3:52 PM (three days ago)

Wow, these are the first 2 songs I thought of after reading the title (and they are listed back-to-back, nice)!

This thread has provided me with the linguistics to understand a style of pop/rock that has gradually taken over a chunk of my listening, especially amidst the pandemic. There's very specific building blocks that I just love:

-Sure, Moody Mid-tempo AOR is not *fast*, but there's still a rhythmic propulsion there

-The verses (and maybe the chorus) feature minor keys but not in a 'sad' way;

-the choruses don't get too intense. Hell, they sometimes feel more like a *pre*-chorus, such as Stevie Wonder's "Go Home", or Bardeux's "When We Kiss" (a song that sounds like what would have happened if Leonard Cohen departed the "I'm Your Man" sessions a little early one evening, then his backup singers decided to record a quickie rap pastiche over one of the backing tracks)

-the cold(ish) vocals involve less longing or serious emoting then storytelling, or expressions of disappointment/indifference

-the guitar solos fall more in line with the "Who's Crying Now" outro lead (which may have secretly influenced like 1/3 of the MMOAR universe from '83 to '88)

-the drums and bass are very 'in the pocket', not too bashy/thrashy

-and this might my favorite feature: they end with a fade-out instead of an abrupt close, because Moody Midtempo AOR is hypnotically comforting - you *need* that fade away, or it's too emotionally jarring have it all suddenly stop. You would be left asking "Where'd the music go - there has to be another verse, right?" It's the musical equiv of the 'vibe' movie that theaters would show at midnight, where the plot is less important than the character interactions.

This type of tunes is pretty much Chris Rea's style.

don't know him really, any particular songs?

great post pre-funk

Yeah, love the case for the fade-out there.

John Waite's "Missing You" is a fun version of this, with the unreliable narrator having written an AOR song and hired the backup singers, and then he realizes how much he really does miss his woman as the background singers stick to their charts and keep doing their job.

Certainly female equivalents are fewer and far between

that's interesting - I think Concrete Blonde played in this space a bit? Like this one

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlg91FG9m5Y

but as suggested somewhere above the most potent words/music alchemy with this kind of track comes from the music being allied to a kind of "keeping a lid on my emotions but you can tell I'm suffering" masculine resolve

don't know him really, any particular songs?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXm_1lWwD8Y

The Road to Hell is the tune I first heard by him back in the 90s. Similar territory to like some Dire Straits, but more weary voice and more lush soft rock backing at times. Never really hear much more until Youtube and by comments seems that Chris Rea is fairly popular in Russia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUUdQfnshJ4

ok wow the road to hell and especially that video gets to the core of this thread more than anything I've seen

Always wondered which came first: Rea’s “The Road to Hell” or Leonard Cohen’s “The Future” (with Dylan’s “Things Have Changed” coming later but similar too).

I always get Chris Rea confused with Chris Stamey. Probably because they both have the first name "Chris."

yeah that's a tough one, very uncommon name