Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/His Band and the Street Choir/archive3


 * The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was not promoted by SandyGeorgia 17:53, 7 August 2010.

His Band and the Street Choir

 * Nominator(s):  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  14:33, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

I am nominating this for featured article because I now think it meets the FA criteria after numerous copyedits and help from editors (User:Philcha, User:Brianboulton, User:Zeality, User:Finetooth and User:I.M.S.) and two FA reviews. This is one of Van Morrison's key albums in his development as an artist, even though it is not remembered as one of his best. I've been working on this article on and off for about two years, so I've about exhausted all the sources I have on the album. I hope you all enjoy reading it and add some reviews. I hope it can pass this time. Thanks  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  14:33, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment: no dab links, no dead external links. Ucucha 14:39, 21 July 2010 (UTC)


 * Oppose per criterion three:
 * File:VanMorrisonHisBand&StreetChoirCover.jpg - No source (WP:IUP/NFCC#6/NFCC#10A); no author/copyright holder attribution (NFCC#10A); rationale is neither detailed nor specific (NFCC#10C and WP:FURG).
 * File:Van Morrison His Band And The Street Choir back image.jpg - No author/copyright holder attribution (NFCC#10A); rationale is not complete, detailed or specific (NFCC#10C and WP:FURG). How is the physical appearance of the band members relevant to or a significant contribution to understanding of an album (NFCC#8)?  Эlcobbola  talk 18:28, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok, I think I've fixed this.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  19:20, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Partially. Saying "could be obtained from Warner Bros. Records" is akin to sourcing text with "could be looked up in Time Magazine".  That's not helpful.  From what website did the image come, or who scanned it, etc.?  WP:IUP is the relevant policy (WP:NFCC#6 and 10A refer back to it and don't offer unique guidance).  For that latter image, how is seeing people lounging about necessary to understand that there was a relaxed atmosphere (The word atmosphere doesn't even appear once in the article - how meaningful could it be when that's the case)?  What's the significant understanding to a reader's understanding? (WP:NFCC#8)  Why would explaining the atmosphere in prose not be sufficient?  Эlcobbola  talk 19:34, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * The image was uploaded by User:Akamad in 2005, presumably copied from a website. Is there a way to determin, which website it's come from or should I upload another image? For the "atmosphere" thing with the second image I was thinking more along the lines of it confirms this quote by drummer and assistant producer Dahaud Shaar: "[Morrison] was feeling pretty good at that time, it was really kind of a positive vibe around the whole record."  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  19:43, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * For images like these (fair use of readily-available media), source is, frankly, largely a formality. If I were to ascribe a reason other than mechanical adherence to policy, I'd say it's to confirm the authorship information provided and confirm it's a legitimate representation (e.g. not a fan-created version).  That said, I wouldn't have an issue with using any source that accomplishes that - e.g. an Amazon page.  For the band image, I still fail to see why an image is needed to understand there was a "positive vibe".  Again, this is merely an image of smiling people lounging about.  Do we really believe that a reader's understanding of this article would be impaired without it?  Эlcobbola  talk 20:25, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I remember reading in a past discussion that the cover images of Van's albums were obtained from his official website (I might be wrong); however the website is not available any more, so I've added a link to amazon. User:Finetooth said during the second peer review about the photos that "The one of the band is more interesting and informative, I think, than the one of Morrison alone", so it's more people's judgement how much it brings to the article.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  21:33, 21 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Sourcing issue is resolved. Finetooth's comment doesn't appear to have been made in a context applicable to my concerns and, either way, it doesn't address them.  My questions aren't meant to be rhetorical; what information does this image convey that words alone cannot?  How is that information, if any, then a significant contribution to our understanding of the album?  Эlcobbola  talk 14:19, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
 * It shows the background and the relationship the musicians had in the recording of the album, which is disputed later on in the article, therefore supporting that "[Morrison] was feeling pretty good at that time, it was really kind of a positive vibe around the whole record." However he disagrees with this interpretation of how the recording went, so this image shows insight on how he was feeling at the time. Morrison later called the photo "rubbish", so how can the reader see if the image is infact "rubbish" if there is no image. The packaging was complained about by Morrison, so the photo's an insight to why the album went wrong in Morrison's view.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  14:46, 28 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Ok, good, that's the contextual significance I was looking for. That being the case, however, the image seems much more appropriate for the "Packaging" section, does it not?  I would also recommend converting that response to a rationale and adding it to the summary.  I'll strike in anticipation of that.  Эlcobbola  talk 12:33, 29 July 2010 (UTC)
 * I've added to the "Purpose" section in the fair use box on the image's page. If I move it to the packaging section the caption would be redundant, because it describes Morrison's band members. It's also important to note who these people are, so would it be better to leave the image where it is and then refer back to it in the "Packaging" section as "the image with Morrison's band members" or something?  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  12:47, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Sources comments: Sources issues were resolved satisfactorily at the June FAC, and nothing untoward has arisen meantime. A couple of books added, a few more citations, bibliography in neater format – all well, no outstanding issues. Brianboulton (talk) 20:27, 22 July 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the review.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  15:35, 23 July 2010 (UTC)

Otherwise looking good to me, and I am looking forward to supporting. Ucucha 16:50, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Comment. The lead contains many short, choppy sentences. Merging some of those would improve the flow of the text. I will give it a try myself. Ucucha 16:26, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Is the editorial comment [wives and girlfriends] in the quote about the female choir members really necessary? I think the meaning is clear without it.
 * "which Rolling Stone reviewer Jon Landau believes have a free, relaxed sound;"—the construction is unclear; does this refer to the songs or the genres? Also, "according to Landau" would sound more natural.
 * Please avoid using "autumn"—it confuses the Australians.
 * There is still an "Autumn 1968".
 * I think you're overusing direct quotes; they should generally only be used when their wording is especially trenchant, and that doesn't seem to be always the case with this article.
 * Thanks for the review and ce; I'll get down to these points asap.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  16:57, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think I've addressed all the issues. I've reduced the amount of quotes, but I may need to get rid of a few more. What do you think? Cheers  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  17:27, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think there are more you can get rid of—for example, under "Morrison and the musician's responses", both quotes hardly add anything to the rest of the text, and I think you'd cover the important points just as well without the quotes and with a few more words added. Ucucha 19:11, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I've cut some the quotes in that section.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  10:55, 5 August 2010 (UTC)

Oppose — sorry to ruin your day, but I am not convinced that the prose is up to standard. Just looking at the Lead we have "Reviewers praised the work of both sessions for their free, relaxed sound, though they contained simpler lyrics than his previous work". The subject of the sentence is "reviewers" but "they" refers to "both sessions" and the possessive pronoun "his" has no antecedent. And is it the "work of both sessions" that was praised or the recordings that were made during them? It doesn't flow at all well. This above, "Morrison entered the A&R Studios on 46th Street in New York City the following June to produce His Band and the Street Choir" is not idiomatic. "Entered...to produce"? Why can't we say "booked" or "rented"? This phrase is ugly "The work's success was largely owed to "Domino",". I see that an effort is being made to avoid repetition of "album", but it doesn't work. Here the "they" is redundant and confusing because the subject of the sentence is Warner Bro. "though less successful, they still managed to reach the Billboard Hot 100." How about something like "which were less successful but still reached"? There is also redundancy, for example "The first song recording that would feature on His Band and the Street Choir was" - why include "song"? If instrumental tracks were featured first, how about "the first recorded song that..". The flow of the prose is below par throughout the article. I don't think it's FA quality yet. Sorry. Graham Colm (talk) 21:27, 3 August 2010 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the review. I've given the article a copyedit per your suggestions. I've also reworded other parts of the article.  Kitchen Roll   (Exchange words)  15:55, 4 August 2010 (UTC)
 * I think the article would benefit from a fresh pair eyes; the prose needs a lot of polishing throughout. This example, again from Lead, "but plans for rush-release forced him to finish the album using some of the demo session tracks" would be better if it read, "but the record company's plan to rush the release of the album forced Morrison to finish it by using some of the demo sessions' tracks". The whole of the article suffers from this shorthand style, which ruins the flow of the prose. Graham Colm (talk) 21:14, 5 August 2010 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.