Many years ago I heard “Precious” and “The Phone Call” side by side and thought I’d discovered the secret of what rock ‘n’ roll singing should sound like. Although she hasn’t recorded an album I care about since the first Clinton was in the White House, I like to say Chrissie Hynde is my favorite vocalist. Most comfortable with a talk-sing meter indifferent to iambs but so intuitive about listener expectations that she understood when to sustain a phrase, Hynde has been imitated by few. Like many first-rate vocalists who write, her stresses come at the beckoning of her melodies. Her band followed nobody — until the deaths of Pete Farndon and James Honeyman-Scott. Even so she recorded Learning to Crawl, one of the great roaring-backs in rock and one of 1984’s quiet blockbusters. With the exception of 1986’s Get Close, produced by Jimmy Iovine and Bob Clearmountain and sounding like it, she recorded no duds, and before you say Packed!, know that this quiet, modest collection addresses (the fear of) commitment without the verities of adult contemporary. That would come with “I’ll Stand By You.”Visit our affiliate/partner site Humanizing the Vacuum for great lists, commentary and more.
