Talk:Mind Games (John Lennon album)/GA1

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

GA Review

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Reviewer: Evanh2008 (talk · contribs) 13:08, 28 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]
Looks like a nice article overall, though I suspect it is in need of a good amount of work. I'm going to start with the first section, rather than with the lead, as I want to make sure I can accurately go over what needs to be included in the lead to meet WP:SUMMARY. Most of these will be prose issues, though I'll probably touch on referencing and breadth of scope from time to time. All of these are just suggestions; feel free to disagree, etc. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:08, 28 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Background:

"By the start of 1973, John Lennon started" should probably be "By the start of 1973, John Lennon had started". Since the sentence specifies events that had already happened by a certain date, I think it's more grammatically congruent to use the past perfect tense.

~~I would change the sentence beginning "Lennon decided" to start with "He decided" to avoud overuse of the surname.~~

In fact, I would suggest a full revision of this sentence to "He decided he also wanted to record a new album, after he liked the musicians that their assistant and production coordinator May Pang had assembled for Ono's album. Shortly thereafter, he asked Pang to book them for his sessions." I think that reads a little better.

~~Drop "at this point" in the sentence following.~~

~~Link "demoing"?~~

There's a sentence that begins "Which were written to fulfil his record label contract obligations," but it lacks a subject. Is this referring to the songs on Mind Games? Probably need to rewrite for clarity here.

~~"After constant court appearances" &mdash Shouldn't this be "Amid constant court appearances" or similar, since his legal status wasn't definitively resolved until '75?~~

Regarding "was feeling weighed down" and "feel that he was drifting away" — I definitely understand what the prose is getting at here, and there's no question that it's typical English writing style, but I wonder if it's the sort of thing that some might object to, since the specifics of those feelings are hard to quantify in the cold, clinical style that many Wikipedia editors prefer. I might suggest rewriting these to mention that Lennon "became stressed" and "began to feel emotionally withdrawn" or something similar.

~~"not helped by being surveillanced by the FBI," ---> "a situation that was only worsened by constant surveillance by the FBI" — Does this read better?~~

~~I would link "The Plastic U.F.Ono Band" to Plastic Ono Band. Also, I would suggest using double quotation marks (") as opposed to single (').~~

~~"Under the incarnation" ---> "Under the billing"? "Incarnation" doesn't typically refer to the name or title of something, so perhaps this is clearer. Alternatively, "Under the moniker".~~

~~"Difficulties between Lennon and Ono were becoming" ---> "Difficulties between Lennon and Ono became" — Simplify tense.~~

~~The clause "After Ono edged Pang on" seems like a strange aside from the rest of the paragraph. I would rewrite it to "At Ono's urging".~~

~~"Pang would become" ---> "Pang became" — Tense again.~~

More later. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 13:08, 28 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 13:43, 28 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Recording and content:

~~"The album was recorded" - I would introduce the name of the album in this section right here, rather than just "the album."~~

"Lennon's quick fashion" ---> "Lennon's characteristic quick fashion" — I can't quite pin down the reason for this one, but I think this reads better with another adjective between "quick" and "fashion." Since I cannot justify it, you can probably feel free to ignore this one if you happen to disagree.

There are a couple structural problems with the first few sentences of this paragraph; I'm going to propose a wording that I think resolves all of them. I am leaving refs out here, so you'll have to make sure those remain attached to the statements they're sourcing:

Mind Games was recorded between July and August 1973 in Lennon's characteristic quick fashion, and mixed over a two-week period. Lennon produced the album by himself, following a previous two-year partnership with Phil Spector. When the album was remixed in 2002, many audio anormallies that were hidden in the original mixing were uncovered.

"many audio abnormalities" — This is somewhat vague, no? If the source in question gives more detail, I would add a few examples. If it doesn't get more specific than that, though, there shouldn't be a problem.

Will check this later Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 08:23, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Okay. For now it's not a problem, but that would be great if you could find any more info on it. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:07, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I would end the "Make Love, Not War" sentence with the original song title. "which Lennon recorded demos of, on 28 and 29 December 1970" should then become "Lennon recorded demos of the song on 28 and 29 December 1970."

Do we have any idea where the December 1970 demos were recorded? I feel like it may be helpful to mention this, if only to distance it from the Get Back sessions mention. As it is now, I could see a somewhat less-informed reader assuming that these demos were done during the Get Back sessions, which, of course, they were not.

Will check this later, though I think the place wasn't mentioned in the particular source I add, it might be in some other sources. Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 08:23, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done Ascot Sound Studios. Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 19:34, 2 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. If you have a page number for the reference, that would be ideal, but I don't think it's strictly required. For a book that's chronologically organised, it shouldn't be too hard for anyone to find and verify. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 01:21, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The cite doesn't have a page number as the book is an e-book. Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 10:59, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

~~"features lyrics that Lennon apologises" ---> "features lyrics in which Lennon apologises"~~

~~"and him knowing about the cause for his insecurity." ---> "and discusses the causes of his insecurity."~~

"On some of the rough mixes that have appeared on bootlegs, they chronicle the time-consuming overdubbing for the arrangement that Lennon wanted for the song." ---> "On some of the rough mixes that have appeared on bootlegs, the time-consuming overdubbing on the song is apparent, as Lennon gradually refined the arrangement."

~~Link "backwards" to Backmasking?~~

To be continued Thursday. Friday at the absolute latest. Thanks! Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 04:05, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done bar two (see above). (Thanks so far!) Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 08:23, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Great work! And congratulations on successfully deciphering some of my cryptic and contradictory comments above. More shortly. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 17:07, 1 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Release, reception and aftermath:

I would drop the "by" in "by arranging interviews."

"and had Lennon waltzing with "her"" ---> "and waltzed with Lennon" — Also link waltz?

"King also reprised his role as Queen" ---> "King reprised his role as the Queen"

Is his reprising of the role sourced to the Pang book? If so, I would add another footnote at the end of this sentence. If not, we'll need to find a source that backs it up.

I'm not entirely sure as the Pang ref and the reprisal was already in the article before I started working on it. I'll have a look anyway. Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 10:51, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

"and reaching higher in the US" ---> "and peaked in the US"

There are two nota benes in the sentence regarding the album's release dates that could probably be combined into a single one. I would separate the catalogue numbers with a semicolon. Very small issue, but I think it'd be better that way.

"toward the foreground representing" ---> "toward the foreground, representing"

Perhaps we should add "in December 1980" following "After Lennon's death", to make the chronology as clear as possible.

Done Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 10:51, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Track listing, Personnel, and Charts all look fine. I will give the whole of the article another read-through and give a thorough spot check to the references over the weekend. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 01:47, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

A quick note: The Footnotes are good, but the Citations are a bit unwieldy. We have books that are given full-form citations many times, when just once would have sufficed. This makes it, IMO, a little hard to follow. You don't have to use SFN templates (though I personally find those the simplest method to use), but you probably should abbreviate them in some fashion. For the second Blaney ref (#5 currently), for example, you could easily just trim the text of the ref to "Blaney 2005, pp. 127-128". Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 02:36, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 11:05, 3 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Final pass will be done by Sunday night. I suspect all the problems have been dealt with, but I want to give it a final look to make sure there aren't any I missed. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 01:41, 5 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Lead section:

Almost forgot about this! Just a few things here.

"was recorded and released in November 1973" makes it sound as if it was recorded and released within the same month. I would suggest revising this to read "was recorded at Record Plant Studios in summer 1973, produced solely by Lennon, and released in November of that year." You can then delete the final sentence of this paragraph, which is somewhat out of place right now.

In the second paragraph, I would add a brief mention of his immigration issue. You could probably keep this in the same sentence as the mention of the separation with no real problem.

Maybe mention that this was Lennon's first solo album without Phil Spector?

I would mention the album's re-releases, if only in passing, as well as the single.

Everything else looks fine. I will be ready to list the article as soon as the above is taken care of. Evanh2008 ^{(talk|contribs)} 21:17, 5 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Done and thanks for the review! Best, yeepsi (Talk tonight) 22:22, 5 May 2013 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.