Quote:
Originally Posted by WatchChain
I honestly don't think an outside producer for "Tango in the Night" could have handled this caravan of divas.
Nile Rodges would have had trouble just getting certain members of the band to follow instructions. Lindsey would be unwilling to listen, Stevie would be missing in action, John out on a boat, and Mick in the corner snorting lines. The only grounded member was the snarky Chrstine. A top-notch, big-name producer would have resigned and walked off the job within 4 weeks of dealing with this s**t show.
By the time Greg Ladanyi came in to produce 3 years later, Lindsey was gone, and the band was in better shape.
|
All true.
I wonder if one of the reasons they recorded in Lindsey's house was to avoid renting a studio to have people not show up. Stevie was famous for that during her RAL recordings. Imagine preparing and getting everything ready and people are late or don't show up. Stevie would show up at midnight on some of her RAL recordings while her crew was waiting all day and night.
The only downside is Lindsey brought all that dysfunction right into his house. Mick said he was doing more cocaine in the Tango era than the Rumours era if you can believe that. Mick was trying to get out of bankruptcy while still doing boatloads of blow and relying on Lindsey to make a successful album to help him out (so he can do more cocaine).
I was really upset when Lindsey left and could not understand it at the time. After making a successful album why not go out on the road for a few months for the fans. But looking back its a miracle he pulled it off. I remember an early Tango interview with Lindsey where he compared the making of Tango to Tusk. He said something like many of the same features were used like him exploring new sounds and working alone without the band.
I would also add that the album cover in many ways is perfect for the album. Its my least favorite Mac album cover because it says nothing about the band. Every other cover made some sort of mysterious statement about the band including Tusk. The Tusk album cover looks like a punk rock album cover which made a statement about the album. Tango is so generic. Its one of Lindsey's favorite painters or painting. I can see a frustrated Lindsey think OMG we cant even get people here to record the album. Do we really think we could for the cover? He probably wanted no part of asking people to participate. It would have been wrong to include the members on the cover since it really was not a full band effort. The music was not really worthy of a mysterious cover either. So Lindsey staring at his wall (not the stairs) sees the perfect fix.