So here I am relaxing after a good positive day. I catch a bit of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang with my son, singing along to the theme tune with him. What could spoil such a great end to the day…surely nothing?

Well, I have just been shown this:

Jessica Simpson and David Bisbal singing Angels live. Yes, that is right, Jessica Simpson singing live.

You have to hope it is live, because if that is a backing track playing for her, then just imagine how she would sound live…

Listen and weep…really weep… I want you to have the same nightmares that I will have tonight…

Love Will Tear Us Apart. A Classic. A Karaoke Killer.

It seems so many artists think they can do justice and homage to this piece of masterful music.

Of the three below, I just can’t decide which one is worse…

First up is Paul Young…

watch?v=nCE_eA0vmY8

Then here is a live performance from Arcade Fire and U2…

Then we have Nouvelle Vague’s take on it…my personal favourite for worst version

Now this is all subjective, but I think this version by Jose Gonzalez is very decent…

And citizen watt likes this version by Susanna and The Magical Orchestra from their excellent Melody Mountain album which also includes covers of Crazy, Crazy Nights by Kiss, and AC/DC’s “It’s a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock and Roll) in the same style…

You know when hear something and you ask yourself “What was the point?”.
Well, this sums it up for me completely…

Scissor Sisters doing Comfortably Numb by Radiohead. The title truly describes the emotional state I was in whilst listening to this version…

Mind you, the point of the Scissor Sisters is a whole other debate…

Thanks to Tim Fraser-Harding for putting me on to this gem….

Now things are getting serious.

Based on my criteria posted on Number 3, I have no problem at all nominating this horror for the Hall of Infamy.

Cat Stevens wrote a lovely little song about the relationship between Father and Song, sung from both points of view. Clever structure, heartfelt lyrics, tender and sad all in one.

Then along came this monstrosity. Boyzone had a way with covers. No doubt they will feature more in this little chart of ours, but their version of Father & Son as much torture as I can bear:

Mind you, to lighten the mood, I found this by two young kids. I really think they lip-sync better than Boyzone…Fantastic…

I am trying to think of criteria for judging what is the Worst Cover Version of a Song Ever.

Here are some so far that artists sub-consciously must check through

1 Use the song to just make yourself lots of money
2 Sing/Play the song without giving yourself to the lyrics or the music.
3 Can’t be bothered with stamping your own personality over the song.
4 Try to sound like the original so you can make a heap of money on sync deals, so doing the original artist out of some money
5 Use a great song to cover up your own lack of talent
6 Misplaced loyalty to a fellow musician and idol
7 Always listen to your guru/producer/A&R person

However, some people judge a cover not by such criteria but more by being appalled that certain artists even go near a song of their idols.

Here is a case in point. Many seem to be not happy with this cover by Dolly Parton of Stairway to Heaven.

Now I am no big fan of Dolly Parton (really I am not), but cannot see how the criteria above fits with this version. It is either just plain awful or really rather good? (And here I realy start to worry about myself…)

So, after the horror of my recent post on AC/DC and the Celine Dion cover, I now keep thinking of artists who have covered a song and managed to destroy the beauty of the original on one step.

Now I am no big fan of early Rock n Roll. Not a huge fan of Elvis or Buddy Holly or Little Richard. However, I appreciate the debt many artists owe to them.

However, what gets me is how on earth Bill Haley and The Comets got away with it. The acceptable face of clean cut Rock n Roll in the 50s U.S. (i.e. white country boys)?

Maybe, but their version of Shake Rattle and Roll has to be entry number two in the Chart of Worst Covers Ever…

Here is their version…all nicely cleaned up (I hear Walmart again!)

And here is Big Joe Turner doing it properly…

So AC/DC, the scourge of the religious right in the U.S. and conservative parents everywhere, with albums such as Highway to Hell and Back to Black, have struck an exclusive deal with WalMart in the U.S. to distribute their music…and some of their hardcore fans are either furious or in shock. 

The issue of WalMart’s stringent music policy is not a small one, but I will deal with that elsewhere.

Let’s not get all worked up on this one though. AC/DC have never to my belief taken any big moral stand against the corporate establishment. They have sold millions of albums and made themselves and the label rich. To my knowledge, they have not flown to Darfur or spoken out against gun running. I don’t think they are anti-fur. They just want to play rock n roll.

Their lyrics are not a rallying call for revolution either. I am no AC/DC specialist, but a quick read of their lyrics includes one about getting beaten up by the girlfriend, one tying the girlfriend to the railway tracks, one about their girlfriend overdosing. They might say that their songs focuses on the personal relationships between man and woman and ‘good ol Rock n Roll’. Some people might find some of the lyrics offensive or uncomfortable, others just wanna rock and sing along without reading much into the lyrics. Mind you, Walmart might approve of their commitment to monogamy (Girl’s Got Rhythm).

Those fans up in arms about ACDC ’selling out’ is an interesting position for them to take. It seems the fans are ok to sing along with the band to href=”http://members.tripod.com/acdcwillie/highway.htm”>’Go Down‘ and ‘Night Prowler’ but not ok to let AC/DC secure their pension? 

Some bands start as revolutionaries then move to the right. Others flip-flop from one issue to another. Others just play music and keep their views to themselves. Not every artist is a revolutionary, not every artist has a high moral code on everything they do.

Now that artists are looking for new ways to distribute and market their music directly, there is no label to hide behind. They have to show their colours. Their fans will find out where they stand - and if it important to the fans, then they will react, and act, accordingly.

Artists now have to be clear where they draw the line. Radiohead and ACDC draw their own lines. One artist we know turned down a seven figure deal wit a brand, because the holding company is involved in arms trading. That artist draws the line very clearly. It is the artist’s choice. Yet the smart artists are also highly aware of the impact on their fanbase of any decision they take. Whether it is taking music to a new direction (Electric Bob Dylan, Christian Bob Dylan, ‘Before and After Martin Hamnett’ Joy Division) or signing up with WalMart, the artist takes the risk of losing fans. They also take the risk of gaining new ones.

AC/DC have made their choice. Maybe is is only about the money. If their fanbase collapses in the U.S. then they know the risk was too high. Somehow, I get the impression they have done their homework on this one.

However, Bob Lefsetz doesn’t seem to think so. He certainly is not happy. First, he mentions that 3 million copies of the Eagles album were shifted through Wal-Mart with no-one noticing. Three million people bought it, I think someone noticed. He suggests that these purchases were an impulse buy. Proof that it was purely down to impulse? None. I agree that supermarket shoppers make decisions on impulse at times. Supermarkets are experts at getting people to buy stuff they don’t need. Yet, shoppers in supermarkets make decisions for different reasons - their mood, time pressure, impulse, product positioning in aisles, shelf position and state of mind all affect the decision. However, to assume that all 3 million units were down to impulse purchasers is breathtaking in it’s naivety. The Eagles were never a ground-breaking act. They took what was a vibrant west coast sound in the 70s and packaged it up for the mass market. So it could make perfect sense from a consumer targeting perspective for The Eagles. A proportion of shoppers at Wal-Mart could be either those who bought Hotel California first time round or remember their parents singing along to it, or it could have been a gift purchase…or they might have liked the pretty picture on the cover.

On the one hand he seems to throw all Wal-Mart shoppers into the same trolley, then he champions the cause of the young fan who cannot get to the Wal-Mart store or cannot download it. On the first point, won’t the young fan just ask their mum/dad to buy it for them when she/her shops?

He is also stunned that AC/DC do not understand that the world is not about the album CD any more, and that it is about customer sampling digitally. He clearly is a fan of theirs and thinks they are making a big mistake. I agree wholeheartedly with him that musicians have to have a digital platform allow people to sample the music. Just one thing though, digital is global, and WalMart distribution deal is only for the U.S. Unless I am very much mistaken and unless a Chinese government style clampdown by Wal-Mart is underway, won’t the American kids will be able to find it online legally?

Maybe the hardcore AC/DC fans who have problems with this deal, but they could look at it this way: Imagine some soccer mom buying a WalMart AC/DC CD, then later getting into ‘Let There Be Rock’ as she heads off to pick up her 2.2 kids. Wouldn’t that be undermining the very fabric of society in one step?

Couldn’t that be AC/DC’s legacy to the RocknRoll revolution? 

I leave you all with something to cheer you up…Celine Dion and Anastacia doing a cover of AC/DCs All Night Long…

Some might find this joyful, some painful to watch…

Just wait for the moment when Celine says to Anastasia “Come on Girlfriend, shook me…”

The McDonald’s ‘I’m Loving It’ chant is up there with the Intel Inside sonic logo as probably one of the most recognised pieces of sonic marketing. But how do you keep your sonic logo sounding fresh? How do you stop consumers from going “not that again”?

Well how about you get your consumers to reinvent it! McDonalds ran a competition in the US to soundtrack their new ad, and the winner was Jason Harper, a singer from Palm Beach, who apparently received nearly half of the 12,279 votes cast at myspace.com/BigMacChant, where folks voted online in celebration of the Big Mac’s 40th birthday. Here’s the original advert…

…and here’s Jason Harper’s winning entry

Not content to sit back after signing up Madonna, Noel Gallagher’s fave rapper Jay-Z, and rockin’ dudes Nickleback to 360 degree deals, Live Nation have now decided to have a crack at the Latin music sector and signed up Columbian megastar Shakira. The story event merited a full page article on the “upstart company that is changing the face of music” in this weekend’s Observer newspaper, which claims that the US-based company have now spent over $400 million on signings, since their first deal last October.

So what are these major artists jumping ship? With so much turmoil in the record industry at the moment, it’s hardly a surprise that some artists are keen to look at any opportunity that might offer them long term financial security. And with record sales continuing to shrink it seems that the major labels are at best unwilling, and at worst financially powerless to compete, even though all of them are turning themselves into 360 degree companies.

However, at a time when the artists are probably in a more powerful position than ever, it seems odd that some of them are prepared to sign away ALL their rights to one company. Artists have long complained that record company contracts were too restrictive, with rights ownership often being the biggest big bone of contention. So what’s changed? Or is the Live Nation signing-on fee just too big to ignore?

It seems then that music and football have more things in common than we’d ever thought! The value of the top players/artists is going through the roof, contracts seem to be there to be broken, and nobody seems to know who’s job it will be to develop the stars of the future?

And to cap it all Christiano Ronaldo and Prince both think they are slaves! It’s good to know that it’s not just art and commerce that can occasionally make uneasy bedfellows!

So who will sign to Live Nation next? We reckon the odds could look something like this:

Robbie Williams 2-1 odds on favourite
Mariah Carey 7-2
Coldplay 9-1
Oasis 14-1
U2 35-2
Status Quo 49-1
Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Sun Ra and Jimi Hendrix are all 1,000,000-1 outsiders!

And then there were four! citizensound has been joined by a new recruit Mariana Duarte Silva, which not only means we can add Portuguese to the our portfolio of four spoken languages (English, French, Spanish and Geordie!), but we also have an experienced club promoter in our midst! Mariana, or the Madame to her friends, is promoting a bunch of amazing club nights with some of her friends at Plastic People in Hoxton, which as Mr Scruff keeps telling us has the best sound system in London town! So now you’ve got no excuse for not going out this July…

For more information about the nights and the DJ’s click More →