The Sparks Brothers

Ahead of the Curve

or

"I've Never Understood Why Music Has To Be So Stinkin' SERIOUS"

Edgar Wright has been re-writing rules for film-making for a while now, combining fantasy with reality, comedy with action, gangster pics with musical-dance, turning genre on its cliche, combining, mingling, crunching, like splicing the DNA of film to create new life in the medium.

But, what would an Edgar Wright documentary look like?

 

The answer comes with his new film, The Sparks Brothers, which details the career of Ronald and Russell Mael, two brothers who have been blazing a trail in music (while never catching popular fire) for over 50 years as the band Sparks. Starting under the name Halfnelson (and changing the name after an A & R suggestion with the first album), the two have put out 25 albums since 1967, changing their band through various adjustments in style and technique that always seemed to be slightly ahead of trends from glam rock to disco to techno to art pop to house to orchestral to stripped down rock, on through the ages of videos—they were doing them before MTV was established—thanks to their early interest in film, only to see other bands emulate their sound and style and hit the pop charts.*

But, they never had that "break-through" hit. The Mael's were born in San Francisco and started their career in the U.S., but traveled to England in 1973, where they charted with the song "This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us," and achieved notoriety for their TV appearances—Russell was the "cute one" while Ronald dressed like a 50 year old, sported a Hitler/Chaplin mustache, and gave off the vibe of a 30's creep/gigolo. The contrast has a bizarre ying-yang effect, not unlike Cheap Trick. As the poster for the doc says it's the story of "Your Favorite Band's Favorite Band."

Part of their "never-quite-achieved-the-success-their-reputation-inspired" result may be that Sparks never took themselves too seriously, abandoning the narcissistic singer/songwriter mode of "This is my story/It's sad but true" strategy for third person narratives with a sardonic, satirical—and funny/ironic—sensibility. That trick never works—as the career of Randy Newman attests. When an A & R rep whined "Why don't you write music you can dance to?" they titled their next project "Music You Can Dance To." And when a chance-meeting led to a joint project with the Scottish group Franz Ferdinand, Ron Mael's first song submission to them was titled "Collaborations Never Work."

Music listeners/fans prefer the illusion that songs are "The Truth," and that they relate to them, as they relate to the performer. Sparks was rarely about that. They were more about experimentation and putting on a show. They attracted attention in Europe and England, not so much in America, despite appearing on Dick Clark's "American Bandstand" a few times—probably because they were articulate...and funny! They appeared as the band in the 1977 disaster film Rollercoaster, which played in theaters in "Sensurround". I wonder if the Sparks segment used it?

Wright's film has 50 years of clips to use for the film and uses them liberally, as well as a lot of talking head segments with the Brothers and fans/producers/rockers/collaborators and they're all filmed in black and white. There's abundant use of animation in various guises and Wright book-ends the film with "YouTube"-friendly segments "Frequently Asked Questions about Sparks" and—during the credits—a whimsical "Don't Trust This" "Ten Things You Don't Know About Sparks."

I loved it. I remember seeing Sparks albums coming through the radio stations I worked at and the cover art was always weird and gave you no sense of what the album was like inside. I never played them, never listened to them, and I find myself wishing I had. I was missing something and it would have thrown a different light on the music that was to become omnipresent in the years to come. The film evokes an odd sense of nostalgia for something you never experienced—although the trends in music all spring to mind when the next Sparks song is brought up with the resulting thought of "Oooh, THAT's where THAT came from...."

It is smart, ironic, and celebratory. So much so that one is disappointed to see it end. One hopes that, like the group it lionizes, it can go on forever, running just ahead of fame and idolatry, but never losing the energy (in whatever forms it takes) that keeps it running through the decades, as per the Mael Brothers, now in their 70's.

They've just collaborated with Leo Carax (which is perfect) on his first feature film (starring Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard) since Holy Motors that's coming out this Summer.** What will THAT look/sound like? Can't wait to find out.

* Oh gosh, there are so many comparisons—Queen (they opened for Sparks in one marquee photo), Human League, Pet Shop Boys, Devo, B-52's, Depeche Mode and on and on. Paul McCartney dressed up as Ronald in his "Paul portrays everybody" video of "Coming Up" in 1980.

**  Their interest in film-making and their bizarre outlook led to almost collaborations with Jacques Tati and Tim Burton (on a musical version of "Mai, the Psychic Girl") but neither one came to fruition.

 

Linda Ronstadt: The Sound of My Voice

The Last Man Standing
or
"No, I Didn't Re-Invent Myself. I Never Invented Myself to Begin With."

"There Are a Lot of Good Female Singers Around. How Could I Be the Best? Ronstadt's Still Alive"

Pat Benatar

There's this thing that happens to me. I've worked with Sound for a number of years, so I notice it. I notice my reactions to it. One of those things is when a vocal artist goes from a resting volume to full-throated in a split-second. My heart gives an involuntary jump and tears can come to my eyes.  Now, I know you're expecting me to talk about Linda Ronstadt (because that's her on the left), but it's also happened with the late announcer of the Seattle Mariners, Dave Niehaus, who would lull you with talking about how green the grass is in the outfield and the count is 1-2 and SWUNG ON AND BELTED DEEP TO RIGHT FIELD! AND THAT BALL IS GONNA FLY, FLY AWAY....

Instant heart-bump. I remember I heard a call like that while I was listening to highlights of a Mariners season for a potential broadcast introduction, potential because there was discussion that the team was going to move, and I heard one of those "0 to 60" calls Niehaus could do and, realizing I might never hear that again and get that amazing heart-bump again, I started to cry. Silly. But it happened.

So...Linda Ronstadt. Ronstadt does that to me, too. She does that on "You're No Good," starting sultry, then on the third verse ("I learned my lesson, it left a scar...") amping it up so you hear the power in the voice and then going full-bore on the chorus. Heart-bump. 

Linda Ronstadt at 16...barefoot.

I didn't really appreciate what Ronstadt could do until later in her career when she stopped focusing on charting pop songs (actually, that was producer Peter Asher of "Peter and Gordon" fame) and started exploring what she could do with her voice...doing "Pirates of Penzance" for Joe Papp on stage and in a movie version, then doing three albums of American standards with Nelson Riddle doing the arrangements—that's when I noticed what she was doing. Those albums became favorites of mine because Ronstadt played those songs superbly and Riddle's orchestrations always amaze me.

Then, she went on to do music from Mexico because she grew up on it, living near the Mexican border in Arizona, and because she respected it enough to "do it right". There were also collaborations with Dolly Parton and Emmylou Harris, when they formed a mutual admiration society and did a series of albums together. Ronstadt started doing more collaborations with singers she admired because as she says in her new biographical film Linda Ronstadt—The Sound of My Voice: "I was a harmony singer without any material." Plus, she's sold enough records for her backers that they couldn't deny her.

But, how she got there...now that's the story.

It started out with her singing at a very young age in a house that seemed filled with music and the family constantly singing to amuse themselves and because it seemed so natural. Her father had a background of Mexican music and her mother a love for classical. They constantly played standards of the 40's and 50's. Ronstadt was steeped in it and she and her brother and sister started a little singing group that played local clubs, Ronstadt usually appearing on-stage bare-foot. The siblings dropped out, found lives. She stayed and found other collaborators, which became "The Stone Poneys." That lead to a manager who took on the Poneys even though he wanted to fire the guys because he only wanted "the girl singer." Ronstadt wouldn't hear of it, and they had a hit record with Ronstadt's turning of Mike Nesmith's "kiss-off" song "Different Drummer" into a woman's rejection rather than a man's. In the studio, the arrangement was less the Poneys' arrangement and lighter—more feminine, along the lines of Joni Mitchell's "Both Sides Now" which Ronstadt objected to. It became a hit, which Ronstadt ruefully admits "It's a good thing they didn't listen to me."

The group did break up, however, although one of the band-members stayed with Ronstadt as she was finding her way. You can usually tell Ronstadt from this period because she's wearing one of only three striped dresses she used for gigs. She wasn't interested in being a star, she just wanted to sing. The manipulation to achieve that would come later and from outside parties.

What she found was The Troubadour, which was the place to hang-out if you were interested in the L.A. music scene. It was where Ronstadt hooked up with J.D. Souther, Glenn Frey, and Don Henley, who became band members and then went and formed a little group called "The Eagles." Their first album didn't do very well, but Ronstadt recorded a song from it—"Desperado"—and raised their profile.

Ronstadt on "The Johnny Cash" show with one of those three dresses.

What Ronstadt was doing wasn't completely definable, although there were many opinions of what kind of singer she was—folk, folk-rock, pop, in an introduction to her appearance of "The Midnight Special," José Feliciano says she's a country singer. The first words of the movie are Johnny Cash's introducing Ronstadt on his show: "Right now, I'd like you to meet a young lady who has what it takes to be around for a long time." But, Ronstadt sang what she wanted to sing, going with what moved her—"Every song has a face I sing to" she would say.

It didn't hurt that she was cute as a button (still is, by the way), but that had a tendency to make folks overlook the voice and what she was doing with it. The face got her noticed, but as Henley notes in the movie, she gave you the impression that she was "feminine and vulnerable—but when she opened her mouth everything was different." Plus, her eclecticism in material made her tough to pigeon-hole and promote, even as she was also introducing record-buyers to new song-writers and old classics.

But, the formula started paying off with the album "Heart Like a Wheel," which began her collaboration with Asher, the first producer with whom she had no romantic entanglements, and it began a string of best-selling albums that propelled her to the top of the charts and made her a top-draw at stadium-sized concerts.

That success allowed her to move beyond pop, rock, and country into her childhood loves of operetta, the American songbook, jazz, and canciones. Her label executives resisted the efforts, but could not say no and were amazed to find that not only did Ronstadt's fans follow her, but new record-buyers picked up the albums opening up new revenue and new accolades. Ronstadt's instincts for projects broke barriers and disproved naysayers, making her a force to be reckoned with.

Ronstadt's last concert was October 25, 2009. She'd been noticing that she was having trouble singing, achieving the notes and effects that she'd been able to negotiate throughout her career. She announced her retirement in 2011 in an interview with the Arizona Daily Star, and in 2013, announced in AARP magazine that she had been diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease. "No one can sing with Parkinson's," she said "No matter how hard you try." 

The documentary, directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman, was resisted by Ronstadt for years as potentially exploitative and "self-involved," and those instincts aren't there. For those interested in her private life, well, there's some mention of Jerry Brown and J.D. Souther, but that's it. One of The Eagles mentions that he "didn't have a chance," which says more about him and the male-dominated environment Ronstadt was working in, rather than her. There's a lot of archival footage and plenty of heads talking, most importantly Parton and Harris and Karla Bonoff. She blazed a trail, sidestepping relationships, survived what she called "the great culling" of her contemporaries to drugs—her drug of choice was diet pills because...expectations—and instead concentrating on her art and career, and pursuing her muse and her quest for harmony, which led her to championing a lot of songstresses and fellow artists. Blazing a trail? She took a machete to it. And rock...and pop...and country...have gained a lot more soul because of it. And her.

The title is curious, sounding exactly the "self-involved" title that Ronstadt was trying to avoid. But it refers to a Jimmy Webb song Ronstadt covered that plays the end-credits: "Still Within the Sound of My Voice." That might have been a more appropriate title, but a less positive one, evoking the thought that that once powerful voice is "stilled"—Ronstadt confesses she still can hear it in her head, but loss of muscle control makes it impossible to replicate. And although she insists in the documentary that it isn't "singing," she accompanies her nephew on a Spanish song because "it's family."

Heart-bump. Tears.

Linda Ronstadt...now.