Rock always shines brightest when it’s played by Diamond
By any yardstick you choose – and whether you prefer him in sequins, blue jeans, formal attire or leather – Neil Diamond is larger than life.
In the four decades since his first chart entry with “Solitary Man” in 1966, the singer has sold more than 120 million albums. The author of such pop perennials as “Sweet Caroline,” “Song Sung Blue,” “I’m A Believer” and “You Don’t Bring Me Flowers” has received 85 gold and platinum record awards, and that’s just in the United States.
Each new Neil Diamond album goes gold, selling at least 500,000 copies. And at age 64, he has just completed what may be his most radical recording ever, about which more later.
At a time of dwindling concert attendance figures, Diamond – says music trade publication Billboard – was the highest-grossing solo performer of the 1990s. His current world tour kicked off with a series of Australian dates in March that earned $14.6 million at the box office. Ka-ching, indeed.
“Performing is something I’m compelled to do,” Diamond says. “It’s somewhat odd, because I’d rather be at home with my family, writing and recording. … Is it still worth it? For those two-plus hours on stage, any kind of discomfort would be worth it.
Diamond has suffered his share of detractors, who dismiss his theatrical balladry as middle-of-the-road melodrama. Such assessments have their grains of truth but sell far too short a songbook that only begins with the sublime string of hits from his days in New York’s storied Brill Building song factory.
“Soolaimon” from 1970 represents one of the earliest pop experiments with African music, and Diamond has subsequently delved into folk-rock, film scores, Yiddish music, Christmas carols, show tunes, cocktail jazz and synth rock.
“When the thunder gets loud and the dark clouds of criticism come rolling by, to have these songs to go back and listen to is a great comfort to me,” Diamond says.
Even as this current tour celebrates that four-decade body of work, the finishing touches are being applied to the next chapter. It will arrive in the form of a collaboration with celebrated producer Rick Rubin on an as-yet-unnamed album scheduled for release in November.
It might have seemed an improbable pairing, the mainstream pop icon and the producer responsible for Sir Mix-A-Lot’s “Baby Got Back,” but they found a common ground.
“Rick Rubin is kind of a visionary,” Diamond muses. “He tends to see things that appear obvious to him, but that nobody else sees.”
Rubin told Newsweek that he was attracted to Neil Diamond because “he’s one of the few universal forces in music that anybody on the planet can sing along to. There’s a very short list of people like that. Somehow his songwriting’s been lost, but beneath all those glitzy shirts is a rock-solid foundation of music.”
The birthday bunch
Humorist Stan Freberg is 79. Actress Verna Bloom is 66. Garrison Keillor is 63. B.J. Thomas is 63. Actor John Glover is 61. Actor David Rasche is 61. Singer Harold Hudson of The Commodores is 56. Country singer Rodney Crowell is 55. Wayne Knight (“Seinfeld”) is 50. Singer Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden is 47. David Duchovny (“The X-Files”) is 45. Country singer Raul Malo is 40. Actress Charlize Theron is 30.