Dan Fogelberg gets a bad rap. Let’s be blunt; if you wrote
\naccessible folk-rock with a country tinge in the seventies and were
\nnot The Eagles, by 1987 merely the mention of your name would
\ngarner giggles from the musical cognoscenti. (Of course, they were
\nlistening to the Cure, so there’s no accounting for taste.)<\/p>\n
This is rather a shame. Fogleberg, for all his reputation as
\nwimp-rocker extraordinaire, is actually a pretty brilliant
\nsongcrafter, with wide-screen lyrics that paint pictures in
\nbrilliant shades.
\nPhoenix<\/i>, his 1979 release, was one of his biggest CDs, with
\nthe million-selling “Longer” leading the way. And let’s be honest;
\n“Longer”, for all its overplay and ubiqitous appearance at
\nweddings, is
\nstill<\/i> a great song. The romanticism of “Through the years,
\nas the fire starts to mellow\/\/Burning lives in the book of our
\nlives\/\/Though the binding cracks, and the pages start to
\nyellow\/\/I’ll be in love with you” is still fresh, and still
\nbreathtaking, if you let yourself really listen without the veneer
\nof cynicism that relegated Fogleberg to pop irrelevancy.<\/p>\n
Past “Longer”,
\nPhoenix<\/i> remains strong, its moods varying; standouts include
\n“Phoenix”, the title track, a bright rock anthem; “Face The Fire”,
\nwith its passionate ecological message; and what may be the most
\ncomplex work on the CD, “Beggar’s Game”, a wistful, rich peon to
\nthe salvation potential in love. While there are some weak points
\nto the CD (specifically the Eaglesesque “Gypsy Wind”, laden with
\ntoo much twang for anyone short of Travis Tritt), overall this is a
\nsolid work.<\/p>\n
If you can muster the courage to admit that yes, the musical
\nestablishment might be wrong,
\nPhoenix<\/i> is a wonderful place to start appreciating a fine
\nstoryteller and musician who only occasionally strayed into
\nseventies excess. Kick your cynicism into the closet and give it a
\ntry.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":24893,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6036],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-36098","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-dan-fogelberg","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36098"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/36098\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24893"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=36098"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=36098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}