It was the middle of the 90s, and a French Canadian singer from a humble background was about to record her breakthrough album, Falling into You, and take the pop world by storm. That singer of course was Celine Dion. The stars were lining up for Celine: her previous album, The Colour of Love was a commercial success, she’d had a hit for Disney’s Beauty and The Beast soundtrack, and it looked like the world was ready for a Quebecois pop-star. Celine’s team, lead by her husband and manager, Rene Angelil (who discovered and began working with her when she was 12—creepy, right?), had a lot of pressure to put the right team together. The man they choose to oversee the album was legendary 60’s producer Phil Spector, famous for his “Wall of Sound”.
On paper, the collaboration seemed intriguing. Spector would be emerging from retirement, having not produced in 15 years, and working with a rising talent with an extraordinary voice and who he seemed excited to collaborate. Things started off well enough with Beach Boy Brian Wilson even visiting the mixing studio. However, this story would not have a happy ending. While Spector is a genius, he certainly is not without faults, and definitely isn’t known for compromise. Conflicts of artistic direction derailed the sessions, with Spector allegedly wanting to control everything. After the fallout of the sessions, Spector told Entertainment Weekly: “It became apparent that the people around Ms. Dion were more interested in controlling the project and the people who recorded her than in making history”. The two sides entered a legal impasse that went colder than a Canadian winter and the tapes were locked away in Spector’s vault. But perhaps through time, and through Spector’s many legal troubles (he turned out to be a murderer), the Dion-Spector tapes will hit our ears someday soon.

…

This type of history is one that really fascinates me; when something that is generally considered ‘tasteless’ or ‘uncool’ (Céline) meets something considered very ‘tasteful’ and ‘cool’ (Phil Spector). I often wonder why certain things are considered cool and why other stuff is considered trash and these types of narratives help muddy the waters. Is Céline cooler now because she recorded with Phil Spector? I mean The Ramones, The Beatles, The Ronettes and Leonard Cohen all recorded with him. Personally, I don’t really care what’s cool, I feel like ‘taste’ has more to do with establishing social capital than anything else. I am interested in how cultures think certain things are cool and how other things are not and what people have to lose/gain by saying what they like and don’t like. One book that got me thinking a lot about this, and where I read this story of Dion and Spector, was Canadian author Carl Wilson’s book Let’s Talk About Love: Why Other People Have Such Bad Tastes. The author, who hated Céline Dion’s music, wrote a book about her album Let’s Talk About Love, as attempt to understand why he didn’t like her music. The book is a fascinating journey and the story of Céline is certainly very unique and complex. I’m not sure I came away a fan but I definitely came away with a greater perspective and appreciation for an artist I too unfairly wrote off.

Here’s a clip below of the author being interviewed on the Colbert Report

Follow Zach on instagram and twitter @avantlard. Drawing by Christina Giovinco