response 184 of 226:

Jan 4 16:41 UTC 2001

Okay...  Now I'm gonna get pissy.  I don't believe in the "selling out"
principle.  I didn't know of Clannad UNTIL I saw the Robin Hoods (and I think
that michael praed kicks jason connery's butt any day, thank you very much)
and from there I found both their music and enyas.  So if you define selling
out a change in their music to appeal to a more mass audience, then oh well.
without that, I would have never found "Siuil a Ruin" and other songs.  I know
that people get very attached to the music a certian way, but I don't fault
other bands for changing or expanding.  I'm a fan of celtic music, but it's
nice to hear something different, like the poppy changes that the Corrs are
doing, or even the Chieftans with...everyone.  

I'm wondering, and it's an honest question, if people call it "selling out"
because they don't like the changes, or because of the following of people
that generally arise from these pieces...

response 186 of 226:

Jan 4 19:31 UTC 2001

David in resp:180 ::  I have cds of "Clannad 2" from Shanachie and 
"Dulaman" from the Irish label Gael-Linn.  I'd have to find them and 
compare, but my gut feeling is that the Shanachie reissues are likely 
to sound distinctly inferior to the Gael-Linn ones, since Gael-Linn 
presumably has the master tapes and Shanachie has been shoddy in their
reissues for Steeleye Span, a band from the same era and side of the Atlantic
as Clannad.  But I don't think any of the 1970s Clannad albums are likely
to be sonic wonders.
 
ashke in resp:184 :: I am of one mind with David on the career history
of Clannad.  Usually the way I express it is, I hope they enjoy all 
the money.    Perhaps our disappointment is greater because we lived 
through it;  the early albums were contemporary releases for us,
and after they signed to RCA (now BMG) there was a tremendous sense 
of disillusionment as the band abandoned most of what made them 
special to us.   Clannad was one of my two or three favorite artists
back around 1979, and I can still recall how it felt when I first 
heard the Robin Hood material.

Since Mike has previously expressed some antipathy towards Irish 
folk music, I wouldn't expect him to like Clannad of any era.
Megan, however, has traditionalist leanings and I think she would 
probably like the albums David described as the early work.

response 188 of 226:

Jan 4 20:08 UTC 2001

Okay, but can you explain then, what you thought they abandoned?  I have heard
some of the earlier stuff, and I find it all consistant with a
progression...they can't stay the same forever...

response 190 of 226:

Jan 4 20:47 UTC 2001

You know, I picekd up a Altan album (a double disk best of/live album), based
on everything that I had heard.  It's not bad, in fact I'm sure that they are
quite good.  But oddly enough, they do absolutely nothing for me.  That kinda
surprised me, actually....but I suspect that it might have to do with the fact
that not alot of it was sung in English....and if I can't sing to it, I tend
to write it off.

response 192 of 226:

Jan 5 13:47 UTC 2001

I agree, Mickey...I love Enya, and the album Orinoco Flow puts me into a
relaxed trance...right around Storms in Africa.  <needs to find her cd when
she gets home...>

response 194 of 226:

Jan 5 14:35 UTC 2001

<hangs her head in half-asleep shame and doesn't mention that she hasn't
listened to it in over 2 years....>

response 196 of 226:

Jan 5 19:40 UTC 2001

My intro to Clannad was the Dulaman album, and there is GREAT STUFF on it.
My latest acquisition is a CD (I think it's called "Themes"), which has some
interesting textures on it, but is definitely "commerical".

response 198 of 226:

Jan 6 02:43 UTC 2001

ohMiGawd... I am going to have to check their website. Wow.

response 200 of 226:

Jan 6 04:22 UTC 2001

Ashke 184: It's a fair question; but cries of "oh no, my favorite band 
sold out" are often misinterpreted (by those who like the new stuff) as 
merely code for "I resent that other people have discovered my hidden 
favorite."  That's not true for me.  I was unspeakably delighted when 
one of my hidden modern-classical favorites, Gorecki's Third Symphony, 
was discovered by a large audience.  And the only band besides Clannad 
that dropped like a stone off my favorites list into the dust heap 
didn't sell out.  (Its genius retired, and it fell apart without him.)

I reserve the term "sell out" for jumping from obscurity to great 
popularity as a direct result of losing the very quality that made them 
good in the first place.

Now it's my opinion that they lost that quality, of course, but, pray, 
who else's opinion am I supposed to hold?

If you like the newer Clannad, then the only response can be "How nice 
for you."  Note that I took no offense when the first response to my 
Enya essay read simply "New Age craap."  I thought that a deeply 
ignorant remark, but I cannot argue with the taste of the person who 
made it.

I'm beginning to think that most of the people in this discussion have 
never actually heard any early Clannad, so no wonder they seem to be 
groping around a bit in making judgments.  (No, Mickey, 1983 is not 
early Clannad, but just after the "sell out", and I vaguely 
remember "Newgrange" as one of the tracks I found particularly 
disappointing, as it was claimed to be good by those who liked the new 
sound.)

Ken: My copy of the Dulaman CD is from Shanachie, so that may explain 
it.  I haven't been disappointed in their Steeleye releases, but 
Steeleye's rockier sound may be less susceptible to bad engineering 
than the extreme delicacy of early Clannad.

response 202 of 226:

Jan 6 15:09 UTC 2001

Mickey: No, don't be sorry you commented.  You asked a question 
("Is 'Newgrange' early Clannad?") to which the answer was no.

I do hope you can hear some early Clannad some time, because as someone 
who likes Enya but not late Clannad, your tastes are so far with mine.

Be cautious about judging from "Fuaim", because 1) Enya only appears in 
a minor role on it (she is lead singer on one song, I don't remember 
which offhand), and 2) it _is_ a transitional album, and opinions 
differ.  I count it as the last good Clannad album, but Ken at the time 
of its release was strongly of the opinion that it was the first bad 
one.

Unfortunately it appears that the CD re-releases of early Clannad don't 
always give a fair impression of them either, because of poor 
transfers.  The one other suggestion I can make is to note that you 
like Capercaille - their earliest 3-4 albums (I haven't heard later 
ones, and understand they're different) sound a lot like early Clannad 
in general terms.  But I didn't keep up with Capercaille because, nice 
as they were, they lacked the full sublime ethereal beauty of early 
Clannad, and which is, IMHO, the only thing that Enya has inherited 
from the band.

Somebody uptopic defended the newer Clannad sound on the grounds that 
bands have to change.  That's a silly argument, akin to defending GWB's 
policies on the grounds that Clinton had to leave office anyway.  Some 
bands change a lot, some don't change much.  Some change for the worse, 
some for the better, others in ways that aren't better or worse, just 
different.  The question is, which kind of change was this one?

In any case, Clannad had made five albums without changing, so it's 
hardly inevitable.

response 204 of 226:

Jan 11 01:15 UTC 2001

True.  It depends what the direction is.

In Clannad's case, they wanted to do the same thing (in fact, several 
pieces on their early "sellout" albums are re-makes), only soggier.  If 
they'd just lost their touch, that would be something else, but this 
was clearly deliberate.

response 206 of 226:

Jan 12 15:00 UTC 2001

Kinda looks like an "Off Off Broadway" type of production.....

response 208 of 226:

Jan 14 02:32 UTC 2001

Yes, he was. I meant to mention that. You can read a short bio and discography
on the Iona Records webpage:
http://www.lismor.co.uk/drever.html