I don't hate music. I just hate a few particular recordings. But 'Why I Hate Music' seemed a much more provocative title.
Last night I heard two songs back to back, that solidified my notion that there are some songs that should never be remade, simply because the original artists already gave us the definitive versions of them.
The tunes in question played on my eccentrically beloved Humbolt 101 – an internet radio station that prides itself on a huge range of sometimes oddball hits and misses. For example, where else can I hear the theme from "Easy Rider" done by the Percy Faith Orchestra?
Anyway, my point is that last night they backed way up into left field and threw to home plate two incredible pieces of poor producers' judgment. I winced through the first with a strand of hope that the next song would offer a soothing balm to my raw nerves, only to be pelted with another hacky-sack of musical saw dust.
The first was "Don't Rain On My Parade," from the musical "Funny Girl." The version most people think of when they merely hear the title, is that which was recorded by Barbra Streisand. Though I admit to not being a huge overall Streisand fan, I also admit that this particular recording is in my Top-100 of all time. Sorry, but Babs really knocked this one out of the park – the musical equivalent of a Ted Williams homer past the flag pole. Anyone, and I mean anyone, who has ever tried to record this song in her wake, has gone down in flames – flames which only served to increase the light shined upon Streisand's genius, where this song is concerned anyway.
One of the "Glee" cast did a nice version, but was only again just kind of aping The Babbala. The take I heard, I'm pretty sure upon a little bit of Googling, was the one done by Idina Menzel. I give her credit for attempting her own spin – at least to set it apart as an alternative to Streisand's, but sheeeesh. That slurry, over-souled style that is so popular now just doesn't work with this song. Menzel proved it. I sat through it, grinding my teeth.
And still champ: Barbra!
My brief dour take of "over-souling:" Today's singers seem to have confused it with the craft of song interpretation. If you listen to say, Odetta's and Mahalia Jackson's versions of the same song, you'll hear power-filled, soul-filled renditions that would not sound alike, yet both qualify as "soul." The style would merely grace each's INTERPRETATION, not become the raison d'être. And on an aesthetic level, Broadway tunes and over-souling rarely… rarely, I say, can experience cohabitation. My humble op.
The second sensory assault that really caught me off-guard, was Roger Whittaker's version of "Good Morning Starshine." I can hear you groaning already. But I'm the one who endured it, in its entirety.
First, the artist himself: Has Roger Whittaker EVER been relevant?
Basically a one-hit wonder ("The Last Farewell"), he has been inexplicably blessed with a seemingly 100+ year singing career, during which he has recorded every pop tune ever written, up to and maybe including those of the early 90s. His last album was in 2007, and his last English hit was in the 80s. His lilting, roof-of-the-mouth, elevator music-breezy baritone brings to mind a banquet of banana sandwiches and unsweetened Koolaid.
This guy was already an "easy listenin' oldies" act when I was in college… Benny Hill did spoofs of him, for criminy-sake!
So here he comes with "Good Morning Starshine." Another song from a musical – in this case, "Hair." A folk-hippy block of bubblegum to be sure, that yet transcends itself. It goes with anything. You can play it in Church. You can play it at an Earth First rally. You might even punch it up on the jukebox in a biker bar and escape with all of your teeth.
The original hit recording was in 1969 by the singer Oliver. I like the song a lot. And the only artist I have ever heard make it unlistenable… is Roger Whittaker.
It isn't such torture when he's merely at "… the Earth says hello, you twinkle above us, we twinkle below…" and just starts to grate on my frontal lobe at "… early morning' singin' sonnng."
It's when he comes to the scat-portion of the lyrics (look up the traditional, jazz definition of 'scat,' it's not what you younger readers are thinking)… the "ooby-doob-dooby-hey walla-halla-hey-lo-lo-looo" section – is where one begins wishing that a flaming airliner full of doomed nazis had smashed into the recording studio at that moment. You fantasize, seriously, that someone had just lost it in the control booth and opened fire!
Whittaker puts so much empty calories into his "zooby-dabba-shoobies" that you can easily mentally picture him grunting a loaf into his pants, in pure unfiltered exuberance, as he sings. I applaud any artist injecting genuine joy into a song, but this is like watching those speed-eating contests. The ones in which some grossly over-weight hooligan weened on Coors Lite attempts to down a hundred hot wings in three minutes, under the guise that it's a 'sports event.' And the only thing one actually witnesses is an indulgent moron trading in an average normal lifespan for a chance at winning a t-shirt and having his name added to a cheap plaque in the restaurant.
Like WInston Churchill using a tobacco suppository to enhance his epic cigar intake.
Roger, this song is about as off your chart as anything. You might as well had tried to cover a Zappa tune. I'm sure he's thought of that. And he hasn't reached his 150th birthday, so it may be in the works.
