Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/Just like Heaven (song)

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The following is an archived discussion of a featured article nomination. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the article's talk page or in Wikipedia talk:Featured article candidates. No further edits should be made to this page.

The article was promoted 02:58, 2 March 2008.

Just like Heaven (song)[edit]

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Self-nomination. My fellow editor Ceoil (who's been to FAC quite a bit, sometimes in tandem with myself) has in the best sense of the word demanded I bring this article to FAC. It's short, but it fits the FA criteria, and has had input from other members of WikiProject Alternative music. So let's have at it, shall we? WesleyDodds (talk) 07:56, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Support: And about time too Dodds. You can go back to sleep now. Ceoil (talk) 08:05, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support: What a FA on a single should be. congrats. cheers, Casliber (talk · contribs) 08:36, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment Logical quotation should be used, as per Wikipedia:Manual of Style#Quotation marks. Epbr123 (talk) 12:56, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't see anywhere where it isn't used. All punctuation placed inside the quotation marks belongs there. WesleyDodds (talk) 13:03, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • Sorry, I was mistaken. Also, the dates and authors in the refs need to be consistently formatted. Epbr123 (talk) 14:37, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support as a contributor. NSR77 TC 20:07, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Conditional support -- Overall, a great article about one of my favorite songs. I do, however, have a reservation:
  1. The "Reception" section cites three reviews, but two are from AMG. The Melody Maker review is contemporary with the release of the song, but I believe the AMG reviews date at least five years and probably upwards of a decade later. Could you find at least one more review dating from the release of the song/album?
Thanks, Caknuck (talk) 20:27, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I was actually searching through the respective Entertainment Weekly and Rolling Stone reviews of the album, but they only mention the song briefly or not at all. I have a couple more places to look and I'm hoping to find at least one more. NSR77 TC 21:39, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Ceoil already searched back issues of NME and Sounds for reviews; they didn't review the single like Melody Maker did. WesleyDodds (talk) 23:35, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I added as much as I could find. Hope it's enough. NSR77 TC 22:19, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment, some minor details:
  • Is it The Cure or the Cure; both are used in the article.
It's quite possible I missed one or two (you may want to check it again) but most everything was fixed. NSR77 TC 23:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Include image of music video? (the dancing)
Added the best one I could find. NSR77 TC 23:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Include Dinosaur cover sample? (since it seems more important/better than the others)
I'm not particularly supportive of the idea, but Wesley may feel otherwise. NSR77 TC 23:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • link Mascis and Dinosaur again. (quite a distance away)
Linked. NSR77 TC 23:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • "Its lyric was written by the band's... The song's music was written by Smith" Some variation needed.
Fixed. NSR77 TC 23:02, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

indopug (talk) 22:44, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • There's a paragraph where it is twice explained how Smith saw the "obvious potential" of the single. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Indopug (talk • contribs) 23:28, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Fixed. NSR77 TC 23:42, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Isn't the key/chords/A Major thing OR? indopug (talk) 23:47, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
No, you can hear the chords quite clearly (they are simple barre chords, so it's obvious what he's playing and what the key it is). If you really want I can cite the Cure Greatest Hits songbook I own, but I don't think it's necessary. WesleyDodds (talk) 23:51, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
You probably should. It couldn't hurt. NSR77 TC 23:52, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, I mean tone-deaf/musically untrained folk (like me) couldn't make out them out. Shouldn't chord progressions/keys always need to be cited; considering you need a particular skill to be able to figure them out (much like, say, analysing a book)? indopug (talk) 23:58, 12 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Cited it finally. Went on vacation this week so I didn't have my book on hand. WesleyDodds (talk) 11:08, 23 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Does the Greg Kot Chicago Tribune cite have an article name? indopug (talk) 00:01, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Unfortunately, no. The fan website that relayed the quotes only included the source, author and date. NSR77 TC 00:05, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
"Robert Smith forced himself to write music 15 days" - is a rather abrupt start. Maybe include the info about the alcohlism put the regime into context and also put "While recording for KM KM KM" before the forced regime in the sentence. And OMG, the word "goth" isn't used even once in the article! Surely the infobox's genre should be goth rock rather than the too-general alternative rock? indopug (talk) 06:39, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Yeah, gothic rock isn't used once in the article, but ""Just Like Heaven" isn't one of their out-and-out goth songs (unlike say, "If Only Tonight We Could Sleep" from the same album). About the most gothic thing about it is the chorused guitar line and Robert Smith talking about how the ocean stole his lady-friend (which, I imagine, didn't actually happen in the incident that Smith drew inspiration from). Alt-rock is as about as specific we can get with this song. WesleyDodds (talk) 07:12, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • It's essentially a pop song. Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me does consist of many songs that can be classified as gothic rock, but "Just like Heaven" is not one of them. NSR77 TC 16:25, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Is that even the correct/original single cover? Google images "just like heaven cure" gives a bunch of album covers without Smith's face. indopug (talk) 05:05, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Object for copyediting concerns
    • Is "its lyric was written" normal British? I'd say "The lyrics were written".
    • The song's was composed by the band while recording in Southern France - get rid of the passive voice
  • The song is the subject, so it works here. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:16, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I don't agree ("The band composed the song" is better IMO) but since the article's about the song, I can live with it being the subject here if you have strong objections. Tuf-Kat (talk)
    • has since been praised by - passive voice
    • Robert Smith devised a regime of forcing himself to write music - is there a reason not say "Robert Smith forced himself"? If his regime was noteworthy (e.g. he wrote music for fifteen hours a day or something), explain why, otherwise, just cut the extra words.
  • In the article cited he said he had to force himself to write, otherwise he would have just spent all day sleeping and drinking. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:09, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • The track was further developed when Smith overheard Cure drummer Boris Williams play along to the track - repetition of track
    • Smith was inspired - passive voice
  • Nothing wrong with using passive voice here. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:13, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • I have to disagree on this one too. There are three uses of the passive voice in one sentence, one of which arguably can't be removed, but actually entire clause can be removed without losing anything - we know the track was developed because the article's about to tell us, and both of the instances of passive voice later in the sentence can be profitably removed. Nevermind, I've just done this one. It really is a major problem throughout the article though. Tuf-Kat (talk)
    • instruments were introduced in sequence, one by one - passive voice
    • Smith offered the instrumental. Smith later admitted he "it meant that the music - possibly a NPOV problem, definitely awkward wording. Is the point that he was being too commercially-oriented (i.e. selling out)? If so either, cite who accused him of selling out (or whatever), or state that he later regretted it for that reason (which is what I think it's getting at, but that needs to be implicit).
    • The song was completed quickly passsive voice
    • is built around an A-E-Bm-D chord progression that is used - passive voice twice
  • I'm not going to go any farther right now, but please give it a thorough copyedit, especially looking for passive voice (which should be nonexistent in most articles, but is occasionally necessary) and over-wordiness (e.g. "devised a regime of forcing himself"). Tuf-Kat (talk) 00:52, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Sorry if this feels like talking down - if you already know what passive voice is, ignore it Passive voice is when you reverse the normal order of a sentence - instead of "The song was composed by the band" make it "The band composed the song". You can also just ignore the passive/active thing entirely and just look at every instance of the verb to be (i.e. was, am, were, is, are, weren't, aren't, isn't, should be, would be, could be) - obviously, many uses are fine ("The band is British"), but many of them will be passive voice, and many of them that aren't will also be unnecessarily wordy constructions for other reasons, so just look for each use and see if you can find a better, more direct and almost always shorter, way of saying the same thing. Tuf-Kat (talk) 01:08, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • Not at all. I didn't write ninety five percent of the prose, so I gave it fresh-eyes reworking. I think I've fixed everything you outlined above; if there's more, by all means. NSR77 TC 01:29, 13 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
        • It really does need more work. There's lots of excessive wordiness ("Just like Heaven" is written in the key - can just lose written, throughout most of the song, except for a change during the chorus when - you're about to tell us what the change is, so you don't need to tell us that there is a change), and I think the "Reception" section (and "music and lyrics") has too much repetition of the word "song", especially at the beginning of sentences. There's also still quite a bit of passive voice that can be removed (" was directed", "was also covered", "was released" several times, "was filmed"). Tuf-Kat (talk) 05:33, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
In the latter situation a passive voice is necessary to show when the record was released, the video filmed, etc. How else would you like things to be worded? We can't eliminate the passive voice throughout Wikipedia entirely, though I completely agree it is used excessively in this article.NSR77 TC 15:13, 14 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree it may be acceptable in parts of this article, since it's an article about the song, certainly the song needs to come first in many sentences. However, take the first sentence of the second paragraph: "Just like Heaven" was the third single released from the The Cure's - this could be Fiction Records released "Just Like Heaven", the third single from... - making the sentence shorter, simpler and providing more info (the record label isn't mentioned anywhere in the article body right now, which is also a problem, I think). I'm not a passive voice absolutist, so I'm not saying I'll object as long as there is any passive, but I don't think this article's style is featured quality. To give another example - The music video for "Just like Heaven" was directed by Tim Pope, who had directed all of the band's previous videos since 1982's "Let's Go to Bed". The video was filmed in England's Pinewood Studios in October of 1987 and essentially recreates the memory detailed in the song's lyrics, taking place on a windswept cliff. could be Tim Pope directed the music video for "Just Like Heaven". Pope, who had directed all of the band's previous videos since 1982's "Let's Go to Bed", filmed the video in England's Pinewood Studios in October of 1987. The video essentially recreates the memory detailed in the song's lyrics, taking place on a windswept cliff. -- this loses nothing and is simpler; it's also somewhat awkward, but that's because the original was wordy and vague, which the passive voice disguised - it could be even better as Tim Pope directed the music video for "Just Like Heaven", as he had for The Cure's videos since 1982. Filming took place in England's Pinewood Studios in October of 1987. Pope's video depicted the memory that inspired the song. (just remove the "windswept cliff", or make it part of a longer description of the video's look and feel, as it is currently too vague - it's not clear whether "taking place" is modifying where the video was filmed (which was apparently in a studio and not any sort of cliff) or where the original inspiration comes from or the "song's lyrics", which is the closest noun that that adjectival phrase could modify. Tuf-Kat (talk) 05:35, 19 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'll be doing more fixes, but in general (as you said) I want to keep the song (and its video and single releases) as the main subject of each section. WesleyDodds (talk) 06:06, 19 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Status check: Has Tuf-Kat been asked to revisit? SandyGeorgia (Talk) 19:52, 22 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think WesleyDodds has done his edit yet. Tuf-Kat (talk) 05:14, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I've been editing slowly. WesleyDodds (talk) 05:23, 25 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comment. The cover used in the image has a cheesy sticker on it, intended for removal by the purchaser. Can you find a cover image without the sticker? --Richardrj talk email 10:01, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Done. NSR77 TC 18:41, 18 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Further - just a couple more things before I support, the lead has variations of "single's release in 1987" in adjacent sentences, and I think a sample of Dinosaur's cover should be included (like how the "Teen Spirit" article has samples of covers). It'll help illustrate why Smith thinks its the definitive version of the song. indopug (talk) 09:17, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'm kind of against adding the sample because there's plenty of fair use media as it is in an article this short. i think it would be a decent addition, but I feel it's pushing it. WesleyDodds (talk) 10:40, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Wesley. NSR77 TC 20:58, 27 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Rewrote the lead. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:23, 28 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Also - Can an admin move the the article to "Just Like Heaven (song)"? Regardless of MOS guidelines, the song is referred to as "Just Like Heaven" in every single source cited, and given that that's what everyone else would expect the title to look like, leaving it as "Just like Heaven (song)" is ridiculous (For reference, "Smells Like Teen Spirit" has been moved to "Smells like Teen Spirit" and moved back twice--once days before it went on the main page--because media and academic sources always write it with "Like" capitialized, and it's silly of us to say it should be titled differently). This can be done after the nomination closes, so as to cut down on the trouble. WesleyDodds (talk) 04:31, 28 February 2008 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive. Please do not modify it. No further edits should be made to this page.
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