Exactly @slaw. I haven’t heard the first Section album (the only one I’ve heard and owned) since the 70’s; who knows, perhaps I would like it now. On the other hand, what I look for in music is pretty specific. I call my taste in music narrow and deep; I view that of some others as wide and shallow (not meant in the pejorative sense).
At the time I heard The Section album, it didn’t satisfy my musical appetite. But I was making a larger point: that any given group of musicians that one likes may not necessarily make music one also likes. That concept is timeless.
I like The Section as backing musicians, but I don’t (or at least didn’t) like the music they made on their own. I feel the same about their current incarnation, as The Immediate Family. I LOVED Ry Cooder, Jim Keltner, and Nick Lowe backing John Hiatt on the latter’s Bring The Family album, but when all four made an album as Little Village, I found it to be not very good.
For me, it’s all about "the song", and realizing it’s potential. Just like a movie script, the actors being the musicians. the director the producer.
I didn’t find The Section album's songs to be very good, the same for those of Little Village. Without a good song, I don’t care HOW good the musicians are. They are of value only in realizing the potential of the song. As Dylan said in Don’t Look Back, I’m a song & dance man (hold the dance ;-).
