so, I've seen this name kicking about for a number of years - but for whatever reason, I've only recently dipped in. dunno why. I think, for whatever reason, that I had her pegged as a fairly tepid, run of the mill singer songwriter... I thought I'd start with New York Tendaberry - as this is apparently her least accessible album - and that's how I like to kick off on new discoveries boy oh boy - this one is pure gold! I've probably listened to it 20 times in the last week. man, it's an absolute masterpiece! I'm pretty obsessed with this album, truth be told. incredible stuff! I'm really looking forward to trying out her other stuff soon. if it's anywhere near the level of Tendaberry, then I'm in for a real treat! cheers guys
Eli and the 13th Confession, and Christmas and the Beads of Sweat are masterworks, and all of her others are more than worthwhile. Her music never tried to be trendy, so it has a timeless quality and has aged remarkably well.
NYT was the album that blew me away, I wasn't really feeling Eli initially but that grew on me as well as Christmas but still, NYT is the high point for me, it's radical in dynamics and there's really nothing quite like it. More Than A New Discovery is also great.
You're in for a treat. Be sure to pick More than a new discovery, Eli and the 13th confession and Christmas and the beads of sweat. All essential
I highly recommend the Sony Legacy compilation 'Stoned Soul Picnic' as a primer, which was my gateway into her music. I can remember being completely blown away by the track 'Smile'. Make sure you pick up 'Gonna Take A Miracle' recorded with Labelle.
Congratulations on discovering the world of Laura Nyro. You'll be listening to her genius for evermore!
Yep, this ^. Eli, Christmas and Tendaberry make up a pretty perfect trilogy. In terms of accessibility, I'd probably say that Christmas and the Beads of Sweat is the least so, but there's not much between those three. They're all great. The later albums are less adventurous, song structure wise, but, as mentioned, totally worthwhile.
Welcome to the club. I heard New York Tendaberry for the first time 12 years ago and I'm still obsessed with the album, it's among my 3 favourite albums of all time. Christmas and the Beads of Sweat is the album that sounds most like NYT, so continue there if you'd like more of the same. Her more accessible early albums are The First Songs and Eli & The Thirteenth Confession, also don't miss out on her cover album Gonna Take A Miracle with Labelle. If you like Steely Dan or Larry Klein-era Joni Mitchell, you'll also like Nested and Mother's Spiritual. Actually, I visited New York for the first time last spring. I couldn't leave without a Laura Nyro LP, I was happy to find an early 70s reissue of NYT at a vinyl store in Greenwich Village:
I discovered her listening to a night radio show on Italian public broadcasting many years ago ( 1987 or 1988). To me, she was simply a name mentioned by reviews about American pop rock singers-songwriters but was not well known, surely much less than Joni Mitchell, Carole King or Carly Simon. Radio host was Ernesto De Pascale, unfortunately dead some years later, a musician loving especially pop, rock, blues and he played most of her early albums until the work with Labelle. I felt in love musically with her. I own four albums: in particular, I love New York Tendaberry. Intense her posthumous live album recorded at Fillmore East with her voice and the piano. In her singing I find an extraordinary expressiveness. In a certain sense she was very spiritual or maybe I feel her so.
nyro was pretty darn good, but obviously not as good as whitney houston in the eyes of the powers that be.
Well totally different era but i get where you're coming from. It's more that she wasn't seen as marketable as someone like Joni Mitchell-who was also a genius but her total physical opposite: blond, beautiful, lithe.... From the beginning Nyro was subjected to pretty vicious attacks in the rock press for her looks, her voice, her body...just staggering amounts of misogyny. It continued even after her death--her nomination to the rock and roll hall of fame was the subject of withering criticism. Nyro made her mark by writing hit songs, not performing them It also didn't help that her first major public performance was at Monterey Pop Festival, and was for decades seen as a complete disaster, with her leaving the stage in tears....
That last story has long been told, but has also been pretty thoroughly debunked by those who were actually there.
Laura was inducted into the RRHOF in 2012. Or is your mention of Houston just coincidental? Sorry if I jumped to the wrong conclusion.
Saw her open for Bob Dylan years ago. Pound for pound, that's the best one-two combination of songwriters I've ever seen in one night.
please do not misunderstand me. whitney houston had a fantastic and wonderful voice. BUT...she just was not rock and roll, nor was she R&B. she was, for lack of a better word, pop. like vikki carr, barbara streisand, etc. if houston is in the rock hall, streisand probably should be too. very similar IMHO.
yes i know its been confirmed that she wasn't booed, and the footage shows that--but didn't she still cut her set short because she herself was so disappointed with her own performance? i don't know the whole story....
Nice! Makes me glad I didn’t unfollow/ignore you earlier this morning for, you know, that other thing, that blessedly no longer exists.
Oddly Nested was my first album, loved it but it was years before I even heard her other stuff but once I did that was it, bought everything.
I got into her when Season Of Lights was released in the UK in the summer of 77. One of the weekly papers reviewed it (Sounds at a guess), talked about her comeback in glowing terms and complained that the record had been cut down by CBS from a projected two disc set to one. I went out and bought it in Our Price the same weekend with IIRC the newly released Living On The Fault Line. This was when I was 15 and sat in a half way house between loving White Riot and Roadrunner (which I am pretty sure I bought the following week) on the one hand and Jess Roden and Santana on the other. I was completely smitten by Laura. Loved the songs, loved the loose vibe of the arrangements, the light touch of the playing and especially these amazing lyrics that were poetic but also accessible. The whole package basically except her voice funnily enough. That took a while. At that time I was still a good six months away from owning my first Joni record (Miles of Aisles) and meeting my first serious girlfriend (not a coincidence) so here was me as an unworldly naif, getting an insight into the minutiae of real adult relationships, positive and negative, via the internal narrative of someone who was walking the walk. It was all about her but also had a universal quality. That was a real education and my love of her music has not dimmed one iota. Needless to say this was all a long long way away from Man On A Silver Mountain! Buy everything. Including the tribute albums.
