Filed under: Clash of the Cover Songs Spinner.com : The Rules for Battle: Each week, we pit versions of the same song by two different artists in a head-to-head death match for musical supremacy. (Sometimes it will be the original recording vs. a cover version; other times it will be two different... Read more
Last night's episode of American Idol was the first installment of the Hollywood Week pre-Round Of 36 winnowing, and boy did it seem like not a lot had changed at all since we were last in the cozy confines of Southern California. Barry Manilow as a mentor who basically gave an inspirational speech! There was a Ford commercial by a bunch of unnamed hopefuls who haven't even made it through to the second part of Hollywood Week yet! Well, I guess Fox needs to squeeze as much money out of its sponsors [...]
Sticking for now, with the ' hits that wouldna been, without a story ' idea ... I wonder if Kenny Rogers would have made the top of the charts, both sides of the Atlantic, in 1980; without a great tale of hurt & revenge?. ♫ Coward of the County - Kenny Rogers 7" single - late 1979 buy Now, I'm not knocking Kenny Rogers by that, he's great; even if the theme's been done to death over the years - it's just such [...]
HAHA! Enjoy last night's performance of 'Never Gonna Give You Up' below. MP3: Barry Manilow - Copacabana
THE GHOSTS OF CHRISTMAS PAST Here's a few old timers who've been out and about this week: Not bad for his Wikipedia age of 68. And according to his own website Cliff Richard's 50th - yes 50th! - Anniversary Tour with his original band The Shadows will be "for the very last time". If I was Hank Marvin I'd be worried; just try to avoid being in a room, alone, with Dame Cliff... This is 62 year old trouper, [...]
It's the time for Christmas office parties, and that's probably the only explanation for the most lax lead ever on the Bizarre website : Lew, what a scorcher! I DON'T think anyone has studied this phenomenon but the more CDs LEONA LEWIS sells, the sexier she becomes. Even in the realms of will-this-do-ism, this is lax - especially since the 'story' is that Lewis has had the fastest download of all time (something the Telegraph ran back on Thursday) and so the mention of CDs doesn't really make any sense. [...]
Politics returns to music news again this week. Lame Duck George Bush Jr. has pardoned the former Fugees producer John Forte . If you recall Forte was busted back in 2000 for trying to smuggle $1.4 million in liquid cocaine through Newark Airport. Forte will be released on December 22nd. Strangely it was Senator Orrin Hatch that lobbied for his release. Jose is speechless. In Fort Lupton, Colorado residents have been sentenced to listen to Barry Manilow . Those guilty of violating a [...]
Between the forever-in-the-making epics and the tossed-off odes to sadness and the crazy '80s radio pastiche and a bunch of other albums, next week is going to be something of a big one for the music business. How should one navigate their way through the music-consumption choices they'll be forced to make next week? Might I suggest a friendly game of Buy/Download/Kill, in which each album receives one of the three fates outlined by the game's title. My personal preferences after the jump. BUY [...]
Even back in Conan O'Brien 's lower-budget early days he was bringing in better musical guests than Jay Leno . Not much has changed. Last night Conan had Portland's own Blitzen Trapper ; Leno had Barry Manilow . Blitzen Trapper performed "Furr" from their latest album of the same name. 'Twas great. The band will return home Dec. 4 for a show at the Wonder Ballroom with fellow Portlanders Starfucker and L.A.'s The Parson Red Heads . 'Twill be great.
Mike Rogers in Tokyo's Record Reviews Hey... I've been here for 25 years... Nothing here seems strange to me anymore. It's hard to write about that sort of stuff. I've begun to think that Japan is normal and the west is all fucked up. I work at a shitty radio station. I know that might seem redundant as all radio stations are shitty, but the station I work at is particularly shitty. You know, you have shit, shitty, shittiest, and shitterer. [...]
Mike Rogers in Tokyo's Record Reviews Hey... I've been here for 25 years... Nothing here seems strange to me anymore. It's hard to write about that sort of stuff. I've begun to think that Japan is normal and the west is all fucked up. I work at a shitty radio station. I know that might seem redundant as all radio stations are shitty, but the station I work at is particularly shitty. You know, you have shit, shitty, shittiest, and shitterer. [...]
i had hope that the shock exit of disco week would be be overstyled, overindulged irish brat eoghan. can't see him doing too well on mariah carey week, can you? yes, it would even be worth cringing through another week of shameless opportunist daniel trying to parlay his loss into a career. just. as long as we can finally get shot of him the week after. my retrospective wishlist for disco week. note, these are based on what would actually do the contestants justice, not the limited x factor playlist based on the paranoid assumption that every brit is too stupid to [...]
I was a little testy the other day. Politics does that to me, which is why I don't discuss it at length ... and why I'm changing the subject back to rock 'n' roll and youth ... When I was 5 or 6 I received a 45 of Gene Simmons ' "Radioactive" (B-side, "See You In Your Dreams") from his 1978 solo record. I played it as often as I could on my parents' hi-fi-you know, one of those stereos with a record player and an 8-track inside of what looked like a piece of furniture-until it [...]
![Barry Manilow: Rickroller [Web 2.no]](http://cdn.elbo.ws/posts/1304635_lg.jpg)
In the latest mission of his quest to milk the nostalgia of any group that has disposable income, Barry Manilow is releasing an all-covers album of songs from the 1980s next month. Manilow will take on "Careless Whisper," "Against All Odds (Take A Look At Me Now)," "Islands In The Stream" (with Reba McEntire), and... "Never Gonna Give You Up." Yes, that's right: We've evolved as a society in such a way that even Barry Freakin' Manilow has to pander to those people on the Internet who still think the phenomenon of "Rickrolling"—in which you make yourself laugh [...]
Dave Koz - Greatest Hits , the first-ever retrospective album from the renowned instrumentalist/composer, debuts at No. 1 on both Billboard's Top Contemporary Jazz Albums chart and iTunes' Jazz Album chart . Meanwhile, lead single "Life In The Fast Lane" claims the No. 1 spot on the R&R Smooth Jazz Indicator chart. The album, which was completely re-mastered by the legendary Bernie Grundman , contains 11 Koz classics (including "You Make Me Smile," "Faces of the Heart," "Can't Let You Go (Sha La Song)" featuring Luther Vandross and "Honey [...]
As if Madonna's 'hey, isn't McCain like Hitler, huh?" wasn't enough to comfort the Republicans, there's this: Dave Stewart - yes, the one out the Eurythmics, who was born deep in the US of Sunderland - has made the above, with help from Barry Manilow, Jason Alexander - the Seinfeld one, not the bloke who married Britney - and Whoopi Goldberg; it's five and a half minutes long, and we reckon two minutes in would make a poverty-stricken pensioner with a malfunctioning kidney decide that they'd be better off with McCain. [...]
This Is My American Prayer Song written by Bono and Dave Stewart LIST OF GUESTS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE: Dave Stewart Forest Whitaker Amy Keys Macy Gray Jason Alexander Colbie Caillat Whoopi Goldberg Joss Stone Buju Banton Ann Marie Calhoun Barry Manilow Linda [...]
The first time I heard it I nearly fainted from the tectonic plate shift in my worldview. A member of the female persuasion confessed...no, it was not a confession. She said, lust blindingly gleaming in her eyes and reflecting off her rosy cheeks, that Barry Manilow is sooooo sexy. And normal, even attractive women -- not Hausfrau moms and bicycle-riding spinster aunts -- have confirmed the
Welcome to my birthday party - I got you something! Hello Vegetables turned one yesterday. 261 songs later, I hope I've been of some use to the planet. Barry Manilow was my first pop-music love, performed my first two "rock" concerts, and recorded two of my first three albums. So I owe it all to Barry. (Or 2/3 to Barry and 1/3 to ABBA.) Though I've always preferred Barry's minor-key melodramas and stories of loss and disillusionment (surprise!), I'm posting a different sort of tune today. It's been calling to me because the weather's been nice [...]
I declare summer officially open. Has nothing to do with the weather, or the holiday weekend. Has everything to do with the gals-and-guy of Toronto-based Shitt Hott and how they're bam-clap-clapping out my stereo speakers. They have summer up North too, y'all, and the way these guys go at it, the Canuck season's got an extra R and three or four additional M's. It's summer! Stable your Dark Horses , shelve your Bible . Shove the awesomely titled Are [...]
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