Category: Scholarship In Action (Page 15 of 17)

Geeze Louise! Pinch me!

• REM vs. Cher by DJ Schmolli – "Losing My Believe"
     
• Sex Pistols vs. Cher by Go Home Productions – "No Feelings 4 Cher" Allegedy this mashup "received the "full blessing" of both parties (or, in the former case, Pistols guitarist Steve Jones)." Found on the EP Pistol Whipped with  other Sex Pistols mash-ups (including the  Madonna Pistol Mash "Ray of Gob."
     
• R.I.P. Mashup: Cher vs. Echo & the Bunnymen doing "I Believe in Killing Time" Message on the site from Mark Vidler: "Am I still allowed to mention this track? Was bloody pleased with this pairing and still listen to this one occasionally. Several months after making it available I was kindly asked by Echo & The Bunnymens people to remove it from the website. I politely obliged.  August 2002" Pansy-assed dolts.
     
• There are so many mashups in this one…I’m dizzy. Whitney Houston vs. Madonna vs. Cher in a "Believe" "Live a Virgin" "Somebody Who Loves Me" mashup called "Believe Somebody" by DJ Earworm      
   
• Alice Deejay vs.Cher doing "This is a Song for Those Who Are Better Off Alone" by Savvy DJ.

Now this is good news indeed! If only I understood how she made the list. Steve Meacham, a writer for the Syndey Morning Herald in Australia, recently posted a list of his favorite Bob Dylan covers. (Thank you Chergoup on Yahoo!, yet again, for the link).

Two things irk me about this article. One, his web links are wrong. He points us to dylancovers.com which is just a landing page with Google ads. The  database of Dylan covers is at http://www.bjorner.com/covers.htm. This site is actually pretty cool. At a glance you can see Dylan’s amazing influential reach. The site also correctly identifies Cher’s whopping ten Dylan covers spanning a mere five years (http://www.bjorner.com/artistc.htm#_Cher) …although technically Cher renamed "Lay Lady Lay" to "Lay Baby Lay," and "Tonight I’ll Be Staying Here with You" (one of my favorites) is listed twice erroneously due to a compilation being taken into account. If we were to count Cher compilations, all the songs would be listed about 100 times. This site has this same problem with other artists, as well.

But back to Meacham’s piece…I doubt he’s heard every single Dylan cover under the sun. Yet he still comes up with a list that is basically the most successful and high-profile of the bunch. He doesn’t come up with much rationale for why he picks the the versions he picks (for instance choosing Neil Young & Crazy Horse’s version of "Blowin in the Wind" over Marlene Dietrich’s version because it’s "the finest cover." Finest at what?) It gets worse when he gets to Cher’s version of "All I Really Want to Do." I’m amazed he picked her version over the one charting simultaneously by The Byrds. Cher’s version beat The Byrds in sales but Dylan himself liked The Byrds’ version. Critically, I’d like to know why Meacham felt Cher’s was better. Is he finally a reviewer who will defend Cher’s music? Yet he provides no real defense! So close but no cigar.

It’s interesting that Dylan made his debut in 1962, just a mere 3 years before Cher. This helps to explain why folk was still so huge in the mid-60s and yet old enough to be taken mainstream by pop acts like Sonny & Cher.

Last week a concerned non-fan friend sent me the news that "Believe" made Rolling Stone Magazine’s list of most annoying songs.

I notice all the songs on this list were massive hits, thus probably most annoying due to being over-played. Some I’ve had the pleasure of never hearing. Some are sexistly annoying. Some are annoying just because people find Celine Dion annoying. And yes, some are probably inherently annoying. I’m going to remain silent on "Believe." It was never one of my favorite songs and it’s probably my least favorite among Cher’s iconic solo quad which includes "Believe," "Gypsies," "Half Breed,"  and "Turn Back Time" – although "Believe" gives "Turn Back Time" a run for the bottom spot in my list. I love "Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves." I really do. But it would have probably have made Rolling Stone’s list in 1976.

Here’s the list:

1. The Black Eyed Peas – My Humps
2. Los Del Rio – Macarena
3. Baha Men – Who Let The Dogs Out
4. Celine Dion – My Heart Will Go On
5. Nickelback – Photograph
6. Lou Bega – Mambo No. 5
7. James Blunt – You’re Beautiful
8. The Spice Girls – Wannabe
9. Sisqo – The Thong Song
10. Cher – Believe

Cher fan friend JeffRey sent me another mash-up of "Believe," AC/DC-ized. You know I love mash-ups! This helps alleviate the annoyance quite a bit.

     Download AplusD_YouBelieveMeAllNightLong.mp3

Alright! Thank the celebrity obsessive Gods!! A Cher mashup! Glroy be the day! I love mashups. I really do. DJ Paul V, bless his heart, did mashup of "Believe" with trip-hop band Portishead. I learned yesterday that trip-hop means downtempo jazz-funk. The result is spacey, stylish and eheral. Whoo-hoo!!

Read DJ Paul V’s comments

Party with Funk That Sh*t: Believe in Glorybox

Last week, an I Found Some Blog commenter kindly posted a question. What do I think about the single “A Woman’s Story,” he asks, I’m guessing in light of all my recent Phil Spector bashing.

Well, I like the wall of sound. I really do. I appreciate it. But I also feel Cher is a wall of sound unto herself and two walls of sound can make one feel a tad claustrophobic. That said, this single and I go a long way back…

The first time I heard the opening bars was in background footage of a documentary that had Sonny discussing his feelings about Phil Spector…the same early 80s Spector documentary I mentioned a few blog posts back. Not only was it a Cher song I had never heard before (and I thought I had all the albums by then); but it sounded crazy-cool. Haunted. Unlike anything I had ever heard her do. And she’s recorded in every conceivable style, so that’s sayin’ somethin’.

It was the mid-80s and I was 15 or 16 years old. I had no Cher community. All I had were record guides from Waldenbooks at the mall. I would scribble down record lists on the back of envelopes without paying for the books. This was before the big chain bookstores encouraged you to sit for a spell and read all day.

There were no good Cher discographies or biographies out yet. The J. Randy Taraborrelli book might have been out but I hadn’t read it yet. So I was on the lookout for the song but I didn’t even know the name of it.

Soon after I got my driver’s license (the summer of 1986), I was still terrified to drive on the highways. So one Saturday afternoon I took a very slow, surface-street drive across St. Louis to make it to the south county used-record stores. I found the 45 sitting innocently in a huge 45 bin. I bought it for $1.50. Can you believe it? I paid $75-100 for similar Warner singles years later on ebay. When I got home I was immediately in trouble for making everyone late for an Olan Mills family portrait sitting. But I didn’t care because I loved my trip to get that 45. I was finally breaking out and finding hidden treasure!

The song’s writing credits are Spector-Tempo-Stevens. Which looking back now, the lyrics feel slightly woman-hating, in a sort of “I’m-trying-to-be-sympathetic-but-I’m-showing-my-hidden-prejudices” sort of way. Especially depending upon how you interpret “woman.” Is this woman the universal woman or one particularly unusual woman? In any case, woman equals whore. And if you’re following the Spector trial, he has a tendency to generalize all women as whores. His high school girlfriend claimed he had jealousy issues. Which links quite easily to “if you sleep with anyone other than me you must be a whore.” It’s disturbing how far we can take this train of thought.

But let’s separate these latest unsettling allegations from the song itself, a ballad about a lonely hooker. What an awesome opening: shrill, creepy backups until Cher’s voice comes rolling in.

I would almost think the wall of sound would suits Cher’s voice; it tries to coat her vocals in sound. But in this case, it’s too loud. Cher sounds a bit unenthusiastic, mumbling a few words. Then again, Cher might be performing a very convincing depressed character.

The biggest problem is that the song sounds too dated for the mid 70s. It sounds very late 60s which was such a specific sound remarkably tied to its time. But then even the backup “ahs” in the middle of the song are too clunky for the late 60s. 

I both love and hate this song’s oddness, its tripped out atmosphere; but I’m glad this wasn’t the sound that Stars turned out to be. “From now on I say hell no.”

The B-Side provides us with more Spector: “Baby I love You,” a remake (and some say dis on the Ronnie Spector original). Again, another song on drugs. But I still love parts of it. I love the ethereal texture of the introduction, the heartbeat bass, the vulnerable way Cher sings the verses, not teenage-frantic like the original. A great quiet performance by Cher (lovely falsetto). Kim and Kath would say “It’s nice. It’s unusual.”  I even love the outro with the free-style guitar.

But then by the time the chorus comes around, you feel like you’re listening to molasses. A musical goopy mess. The song feels like a single-engine plane that can’t quite take off. Double Darn It.

Then there was also “A Love Like Yours” by Cher and Harry Nilsson. Same story: dated, maddeningly-slow, messy. I can’t even understand what they’re singing. Plus it seems like a rip off of Dylan’s  “Knocking on Heaven’s Door.” The whole thing is labored, plodding and lifeless; although it almost sounds like Cher is screeching at the end. 

Speaking of Phil working with Cher, we can’t forget her first studio performance, “Ringo I love You,” a bizarre sounding thing, a garage-band guitar, Beatlesque tempo and yeah yeahs.” And still, the song has no omph, it’s so slow. A flat, Frankenstein vocal performance, too.  This was an unfortunate way to introduce Cher to the public. Many thought she was a man singing. But I think she sounds more exotic than masculine.

The best wall of sound Cher song, in my humble opinion, is “Dream Baby.” And this was a Sonny Bono interpretation of the wall. I only have a stereo version on my iPod. Does anybody out there have the mono version? What’s the difference?

Anyway, Sonny captured a Ronettes-like sound except Cher’s makes it a Gothic girl group. Her 60s voice can sound amazingly innocent and experienced at the same time. It’s a great, simple vocal. And Sonny does the right thing by tempering the wall of sound so as not to compete with Cher’s voice. The percussion sounds cleaner and the sax is fun. It’s like a little wall Cher can sit on and kick up her feet.