Sparks: classic or dud?

I was surprised at seeing him as a not-so-skinny jock teenager.

That would be Russell, not Ron.

appears from it that Tsui Hark was going to direct 'Mai The Psychic Girl'

Yup, this was mentioned at the time -- liner notes for the early 1990s Profile 2 CD best-of on Rhino drew that connection, and is also why there's a later song featuring him on GS&SV called, of course, "Tsui Hark."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5cYZnKpEBE

I assume Ned is on nodding terms w/them, so if he's had the red light then I guess nobody will.

We've met at larger events briefly and they remember me from when I ran the online fan discussion list (when such things were novel) from the mid-90s into the 2000s; Russell at least lurked there in deep cover, and I've interviewed him briefly once or twice. I claim nothing more than that; however, their manager Sue, who was featured in the documentary, and I have chatted off and on more regularly. Again, my book idea was just a wild hair; I hadn't even gotten around to an initial note of inquiry to her before I read that Russell quote and quietly ditched it.

sic is generally OTM there in terms of what works/what doesn't for Sparks, and there really is no question the late 80s was a dry gulch for them. It's worth noting that the arc could have even gotten more exhaustive because they very much did release work pre-GS&SV in the 1990s; I specifically remember reading Simon Price's interview with them in late 1993 when this one-off single with Fini Tribe came out:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Iz53uzlNls

Including that would have slightly undercut the lengthy lull period that the documentary was establishing...but in turn would have made a long film even longer!

There's two hours of extras via the Blu-ray, FWIW, and that's not even including the separate full-length concert!

Blimey, gonna have to plump for that one. Who knows, a certain UK TV pop quiz show appearance...

(then again, last I heard it was 'missing believed wiped')

The Rhino set is so good and I wish it was still in print instead of the inferior movie soundtrack

The liner notes alone! Amazing details.

This interview with her is interesting.🕸

The more distance I have from this doc... the more I hate it! Edgar Wright sux!

It rocks and I just saw One Night in Soho and that rocked too

*Last Night in Soho

one night in soho makes a dead girl humble

Felt blatantly not in depth about the Maels, outside of the beginning and a bit at the end, which ends up being frustrating. It was like watching a really great VH1 “Behind the Music” stretched out.

that feels deliberate. they don't really lead rock star kind of lives, they don't drink nor do drugs and by most accounts they're pretty nice people. their personal lives might not be all that interesting.

B-b-but Ron dated Edith Piaf - how could their personalizes not be interesting?!

Meantime it was a delight to be tagged in this post and to realize that years back I'd help make another fan:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CV1BpyaFoUq/

I knew v little about them going in (didnt even know they weren’t English)

i found the documentary illuminating in the sense of their perseverance and the full scope of their career. that aspect was quite incredible

but at the same time, the trainspotting-ness of the documentary also turned me off after a while. too precious? too knowing? too specific? idk. somehow i felt like the doc was trying to ~convince~ me to like them rather than illustrating more why they are loved. it felt like if a friend was playing me their albums & sitting next to me the whole time watching for any reaction. like “eh? pretty good huh?” which is very offputting in any setting lol

a few songs caught my attention, but by and large i find their music still sits at a distance, personally - i think mainly because the style is very removed from what i’m used to i guess? the dissonance & repetition & russell’s odd way of singing reminds me of a carnival funhouse

that's the way most music docs are though right? but yeah and it does get a little overbearing at the end. it's 2+ hours of "these guys are great" and then 10 more minutes of "in conclusion, they are great". they do entertain ideas of why people may not like them but it's kind of phrased as listeners being not ready or possibly homophobic. there's another possibility - Sparks can be really fucking annoying. most people I've played 'em for like them while a few others break out in hives. I mean, you're right, it's circus music.

the other thing about that is as a newcomer there's not really a lot of indication of what their good and bad albums are, it's all presented as "wow so clever!" like for me a huge part of their story is Li'l Beethoven and "Dick Around" and how they were arguably doing their best and most innovative work some 35 years on. they do mention that it's particularly good but its couched in the same language that's used to describe basically all their albums

speaking of, I wished they'd spent more time on that concert series where they played every single album in full. is there good footage of it? did some people actually go to every show? it's such a crazy endeavor for a band to embark on.

Somebody wrote a book about seeing every show, but the excerpt I read was more like "thoughts that occurred to me during the weeks I spent seeing the Sparks Spectacular".

THAT part of their story was a doc of its own. What a mammoth, crazy undertaking!

I think there were quite a few that watched every night online, so...

(Ned?)

A few years ago someone put together this 11-hour compilation video of most of the footage that could be found:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHXPajDSZ24

Pretty sure the vast majority of it is from livestreams that people captured at the time. The streams were pretty low quality, but I think this is the best we've got.

Somebody wrote a book about seeing every show, but the excerpt I read was more like "thoughts that occurred to me during the weeks I spent seeing the Sparks Spectacular".

Yeah, the whole book was like that. Can't recommend it.

how many animation interstitials were in this thing? and weren't there like 5 different styles? lol i remember claymation and like squiggle vision and a few more. anyway the number #1 sign of a lazy doc is animated interstitials.

the Cyriak video for "The Existential Threat" is kinda interesting in that regard since Sparks have used that same kind of style for their videos (and indeed, it's all over this) but obviously nowhere near as well nor as freaky as Cyriak does. that video has 5.5 million views and seems to have introduced yet another new group of young folks to the band. alas, it probably came out too late to be mentioned in the documentary

I think there were quite a few that watched every night online, so...

(Ned?)

Only missed one webcast!

whoa

Just finished. More so than anything else, this felt the movie version of a 120 page liner notes book from an exhaustive career-spanning box set.

I liked the animations.

I also just watched this and, unlike most career-spanning docs, I appreciate the time and detail Edgar put into the later years of material. I guess the whole point is that they've never stopped and remain vital, but most docs cut off when boomers or gen x'ers stopped caring and then just rush through from that point to the present in five minutes.

Also, Ron Mael is now my favorite person in the world.

I love that his daily driver is a Volkswagen Thing.

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51IIpK70QiL._AC_.jpg

I'll see this sooner or later, but these descriptions sound terrible.

― Halfway there but for you, Thursday, June 24, 2021 8:02 PM (seven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Seen it, am actually mostly satisfied.
Stylistically, there was such a variety of visual approaches and material, and the pace was kept fast enough, that things like the animation or the vintage B&W "commentary" inserts didn't bother me, it was just another 2 or 3 seconds until something else showed up. Also, it wasn't really an "exploration" of each of the albums, they're just signposts so you don't say, "wait, what decade are we in again"? Also, keeping the pace so fast allows for the very unusual sequence of the 1988 to 1995 era, where the pace is deliberately slowed down instead of sped up.
I think it was true to the "Sparks ethos" inasmuch as everything - Ron and Russell talking, performance footage, celebrity testimonials - was presented as if in quotes, like "here's the bit where we self-consciously echo the things you've seen in dozens of these documentaries".

Do the Maels or their fans in the film admit that any of the records were sub-standard?

― Halfway there but for you, Friday, June 25, 2021 4:28 PM (seven months ago) bookmarkflaglink

I think the only one that really gets critiqued this way is Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat? Even Interior Design (which I quite like) has someone saying something nice about it.

I’m not a big enough fan to read this thread to see if this is already covered, but the thing that struck me the most about the documentary is that the Sparks guys made it pretty clear that they were only willing to make a documentary if it went against traditional rock documentary standards and then went on to deliver a relatively conventional rock documentary.

I wonder if the fact that they were making Annette at around the same time made them less inclined to press that point - knowing that they were making their mark in a Proper Film, it might have been less important to have their rock doc be as odd as they themselves can be.

I think most Sparks fans will admit that not all their albums are good but yeah Pulling Rabbits seems to be the only one that's universally derided. Last year I decided to listen to all of Sparks' albums and it struck me that their songwriting was actually a lot more consistent than I'd remembered. The relative quality of the albums has more to do with the arrangements & production. That's why Kimono & Propaganda are universally regarded as classics, they had such a powerful glam/prog/power pop sound that just fills the room. Likewise No. 1 in Heaven still feels like it's from the future, it's so crisp and propulsive. And of course their modern albums all sound great & have intricate and full arrangements. On the other hand on their bad albums it's not just the songs, it's that they sound like garbage. Mostly those post-band 80s ones which either sound incredibly thin or have that stupidly loud reverb/choral effect on everything. Even Big Beat suffers from this, sounding like it was recorded in a shoebox.

But the songs themselves are generally salvageable. Check out the Plagiarism, particularly "Pulling Rabbits Out of a Hat", which re-envisions the song as if it was written during the Li'l Beethoven sessions (though that album was still 5 years away!) - it's totally massive and honestly one of my favorites on the whole disc

Now that I think about it I'm surprised Plagiarism was barely mentioned - for one they got Mike Patton at the height of his fame, and that seems like a pretty significant influence. For two the direction they took on some of those tracks clearly pointed towards what they'd do for like...the entire 21st Century (so far). And yet in the documentary it's like..."eh, we had no ideas"

I also tried listening to them all last year too, and stopped after slogging through Angst In My Pants, which at only 36 minutes seemed as long as Berlin Alexanderplatz.

Madness

As for Plagiarism, they've spoken before about how they were essentially talked into it, preferring not to look back in general. I think if it had just been a straight-up tribute album they'd be happy with it.

Do the Maels or their fans in the film admit that any of the records were sub-standard?

― Halfway there but for you

I remember a few years back they were asked which was the worst Sparks album and they both answered Terminal Jive. I think it was in some questionnaire in Uncut Magazine maybe?

Man, realized I forgot to post here about the LA show last month! Well, having seen that and last night's SF show to kick off the full tour, you absolutely want to go to this if you have even the slightest interest in the band. I've been seeing them regularly for a quarter of a century and every show has been great in its own way but both these recent shows were compact overviews of their whole career, and it's a great summary and perfect introduction to them if you're relatively new to them and a lovely retrospective if you're in deep like me. Ron dance in full effect of course, and Russell still has the pipes and energy to burn, not that I've ever seen him lack those. Good times for sure.

Aah, so jealous you got to see them at Disney Concert Hall! Definitely one of those times I was wishing I still lived in LA. I'll be seeing them next week at Big Ears though. Recent setlists look fantastic - I wish they were doing more from A Steady Drip, but hard to have any complaints about that song selection.

Saw them in New York last night. Great to see them on a much bigger stage. You can tell they've tailored the setlist to please people who saw the movie, but I don't care, it's all good. And they seemed genuinely thrilled by the reception they got. They said that both a new album and another movie musical is on the way. Amazing.

I had to miss them in St. Paul, I was out of town. I love that they're doing "Under The Table With Her," one of my favoritest faves.

They've signed to Island. 50 years after they last signed to Island. And a new album is coming 26 May (days before I see them in London).

Midnight Special, 1974

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IVTSdF-YzI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=viAmueyo0cc