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Wikipedia:Featured article candidates/The Greencards

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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 by User:SandyGeorgia 00:32, 5 October 2008 [1].

The Greencards edit

Nominator: Rootology (talk)
previous FAC (00:12, 18 July 2008)


Hi, I would like to try to renominating this. It has been up in July 2008 at the above link, and before that in June 2008. In the interim it became a Good Article. I want to try again, almost 100 edits later. Cla68 and Andreasegde have helped out on copyediting, and I think it's much better now. As far as I can tell, every criticism has been addressed. It's been physically restructured as well to have similar structures and layouts as other FAs for various bands. I was thinking of trimming back the historical information on the band members seen under The Greencards#Formation as I've replicated the material (and cut some already!) to the various subarticles for the band members and also a bit for the album articles. The history of the formation of the Greencards is a core part of the majority of the sources on the band, and a major aspect of the subject itself--three highly trained foreigners basically forming a niche supergroup that has redefined an extremely American musical style. What else does it need, from where it stands now? Thanks!! rootology (C)(T) 05:44, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I was going to post this on the talk page, but saw it's at FAC so came here instead. A note on the images; if you have an image taken in (say) 2004, don't use it in the section on 2000 (the first year I saw in the Formation section). And if this means you have more images than you can fit into one section, it's OK, you still have your Commons gallery. Also, the infobox image needs a caption. Giggy (talk) 05:49, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I rotated the images around to fix this, and pulled the extraneous images. I captioned the image, too. Thanks Giggy. rootology (C)(T) 06:01, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've made a stack of edits to the article (copyediting, MOSing, other stuff), so please check over them! I'm popping out now but I'll take another look tomorrow. Giggy (talk) 06:05, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you! I'll be mostly offline except spurts till Friday evening US time, myself, but will pick this up with any changes or suggestions then. Thanks again! rootology (C)(T) 06:08, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • The reference [2] is dead. The wayback machine found [3]. Is that the right source? LegoKontribsTalkM 07:26, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Hi, that is the source, thank you--I updated it on the article with the archival url. rootology (C)(T) 04:56, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comments - sources addressed last FAC. I too note the dead link showing up with the link checker tool, otherwise looks good. Ealdgyth - Talk 13:31, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you! Like I mentioned above, I fixed the issue of the dead link. rootology (C)(T) 23:17, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Comments Great to see some good music at FAC for a change! :)
  • Often labeled as part of, and said to be representative of the "newgrass" movement, they draw from Irish traditional, European gypsy, rock 'n' roll, folk balladry, and Latin American musical sources. Links please. What is "European gypsy"?
  • Raised in South London, McLoughlin began to perform country music shows with his family on weekends, influenced by George Jones, George Strait and Ricky Skaggs. Link Ricky Skaggs, and the others if they have articles.
  • Young and Warner knew each other previously and, according to Warner, had been drawn to bluegrass and American roots music through an appreciation of George Jones and Merle Haggard. Would read more smoothly if the comma was before the "and".
  • The third paragraph of the first section needs a copyedit. Seems as if every sentence starts or contains a "Before..." or an "After...".
  • They named themselves The Greencards, for the fact that all three band members carried United States green cards. I don't quite like "for the fact" in this context.
  • Given a noon to 3 pm time slot, they surprisingly began to fill the pub with patrons week after week, with fans there calling them the "Bluegrass Bunch". Which time zone? Also, "with" is a poor connecting word.
  • Some more information in the "Movin' On (2003–2004)" section would be nice. Right now, it's the same block of text that's in the album's article.
  • During the summer segment of the 2005 tour with Nelson and Dylan, Kym Warner wanted to have the opportunity to pick Dylan's brain, but never had the chance. What?
  • Eamon McLoughlin is a regular blogger for Country Music Television.[2] After the Grammy Awards, he wrote about the band's experience at the event. Somewhat of a cliffhanger. What did he write?
  • In the See also section, Bill Monroe, despite being the "inventor" of bluegrass, doesn't seem very relevant.

Well done article overall. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 19:35, 25 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Julian, take a look now? I've fixed everything you mentioned, except expanding further (yet) the Movin' On section. That material actually was in the The Greencards first, and I'll start digging up more sources on that first album (it got the least press of all of them). And yep, their music was a wonderful find--my wife and I completely accidentally stumbled upon them attending a Paperboys show. We were very early, paid admission, and thought The Greencards were opening. Turns out, it was a totally separate show with their own openers on earlier! Pure dumb luck find. :) rootology (C)(T) 23:17, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Looks good. I'd like to see a little bit of more information for that one section, and then I'll happily support. –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 23:25, 27 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I think I've got that section expanded out about as far as I might be able to get it for now without starting to dip into random blogs and sources that would be borderline RS for a featured article. They unfortunately didn't get a ton of widespread press until the second release of Movin' On, which came right before Weather and Water, when they sort of exploded all over. rootology (C)(T) 00:32, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Support Looks good. Maybe next time I'll see this at FAC? :-) –Juliancolton Tropical Cyclone 02:08, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you! That is really tempting, since them and Bill Monroe should be FAs... after this and this... :) rootology (C)(T) 06:40, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • "The Greencards are a progressive bluegrass band that formed in Austin, Texas, and is currently based in Nashville, Tennessee." - need a consistent "is" or "are" throughout the article. Giggy (talk) 12:23, 28 September 2008 (UTC) A full review and a support soon, I promise.[reply]
  • I got that (and I think) there aren't any others. Thanks for the help... rootology (C)(T) 15:02, 28 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I've left comments on the musical style section here. Giggy (talk) 07:22, 29 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I'm going to expand that section by hopefully a good 1-2 paragraphs the next couple of days. rootology (C)(T) 06:40, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I replied on my talk to Giggy about the copyediting points he left there (I fixed them all) and have been expanding out the section further as requested. rootology (C)(T) 05:07, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. I helped copyedit the article and put the external links section in the web citation format. I think the article meets the FA criteria. Cla68 (talk) 02:04, 30 September 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Thank you for all your help, Cla. rootology (C)(T) 06:40, 1 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I originally read this: "...were invited to tour with Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson in the same year"" to mean that the band was invited by BD and WN separately in the same year; later saw otherwise... can move "in the same year" to an earlier position in the sentence?
  • I also know what you mean by "is not as unlikely as it may seem", but I just can't find it in my heart to let that go.. it appears too WP:POV-ish, even if its idea is kinda self-evident. Ling.Nut (talk—WP:3IAR) 13:34, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • That's a direct take from the wording of Mario Tarradell, the author of the source I quoted McLoughlin's "it's ironic" bit from, here. Tarradell calls the idea outrageous, I used the wording unlikely. The idea of them being "foreigners" playing such an American form of music is such a major bit of all the stories about them, I didn't want to leave that off--it's like the perfect exclamation point to it all. Is that still too ORy since Tarradel basically says the same thing I did? How about this wording? It's built entirely from the literal quoting, wording, and attribution in the WFAA source, so I think that would nuke even any shade of OR. rootology (C)(T) 13:45, 2 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support but - 1. "Movin' On (2003–2004)" section, put the sample music under the main box per MoS. 2. "Weather and Water (2005–2006)" The left music sample may seem a little odd (this is aesthetic, and not an actual problem). 3. "Viridian (from 2007)" Image should be under the main template. 4. "See also" should be integrated into the text so people can see why they should look over at the other pages. Ottava Rima (talk) 14:32, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
    • Done 1 and 3. Left 2 and the other 3 (should that be 4?) for Rootology to decide. Giggy (talk) 14:38, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
      • Haha, yes, it should be a 4. :) 2 isn't important (I just wanted to mention it), but 4 might be. Ottava Rima (talk) 15:03, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support. Giggy (talk) 14:38, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Looks very good, leaning support. Some things:
    • "The band was founded in 2003 by Kym Warner and Carol Young from Australia, and Eamon McLoughlin from England, who met in Texas." - it's very awkward with all the commas, but I understand what you're trying to say. Maybe break up the nationalities into another following sentence with some extra info so it doesn't feel so tacked on?
    • "early- to mid-2009" - check WP:DASH to see if that space should be there or not.
    • "with a worldly feel" - that tells me nothing. Do you mean with a style reminiscent of world music? 'Cause I could get behind that.
    • There are places where there are little introductions and flair language which doesn't enchance the prose, ex. "Early on..." - go through and remove these redundant elements
    • "is not as outrageous as it may seem" POV language - if this is what the talking head actually said, quote it. Otherwise rephrase.
    • fix instances of passive voice, ex. "Their first performance together as a band" to "The band's first performance"
  • My overall suggestion is just get another editor not acquainted with the subject to give it a rundown. It's only some minor prose issues keeping it from being brilliant, IMO.

Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs (talk) 18:19, 3 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • I'm going to try to fix some of these up real quick. For the worldly bit/comment, it's from this source. The world music would be accurate, I'd think, but I'm wondering if that would be OR to say if the source didn't? Dash there sorted by just eliminating it, and take a look at the "outrageous" passage now. I reworded it again. Going back for more... rootology (C)(T) 03:11, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • All thats really left is the passive voice concerns you had, and the question of OR in linking worldly to world music, from that cited quote. Let me know what you think. I got some of the frilly language you mentioned, but I can't see anymore. I'll try to clean up the passive voice tomorrow if I can, but that sort of fine tuning isn't my strong suit... rootology (C)(T) 05:01, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - What makes americanahomeplace.com a reliable source? Otherwise, the sourcing for the article looks okay. --Aude (talk) 05:13, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • Hi Aude, that came up on the first FAC (but it's buried, so super easy to miss--I had to look again myself). So... "Its one of the larger radio shows for that niche genre of music (Bluegrass, and specifically the forms that this band plays, aren't big market--the fact this band got a Grammy and the press it is has is monstrous). It looks like a smaller site, but thats like comparing a smaller-town newspaper to CNN, if you're comparing this scale of the music industry to MTV News." Sorry for the copypasta from there. :) rootology (C)(T) 05:19, 4 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Support - It makes sense that a radio show for this genre might not have as much high-traffic/audience. I'm satisfied that the sourcing is okay, with a variety of news media and other such sources. It's also good that you were able to find several good quality images for the article, with proper licensing. I also believe the article is well-written. Nice work with this article. --Aude (talk) 21:46, 4 October 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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