Which is the funnier piece of music news this week: that the Walrus of Love Barry White (right) spoke (to a rapturous response) at Oxford on Monday or that 'NSync are going to star in Grease 3? Now why in the world, if you're a multiplatinum-selling group, do you choose to star in the sequel to a terrible sequel? I hope this isn't them trying to "do a Bjork" and win prizes at Cannes. What makes people want to cross over from one medium to another? What makes them think they can succeed in multiple fields? Why is KISS bassist Gene Simmons creating a sitcom for VH1?
Actually, maybe we should get Barry White to speak at Harvard. I want voice lessons.
LET'S DO THE TIME WARP AGAIN
COVER TO COVER
Still, it's hard to truly hate cover versions. I feel anything that brings a good song back to attention is a good thing, even if the cover is execrable (hello, Sheryl Crow). Marilyn Manson is going to cover "Suicide is Painless"-the theme song to M*A*S*H-on the soundtrack to the Blair Witch Project sequel. Is it just me, or is the whole Manson thing way too tired? But it's a great song, so bleak ("Suicide is painless/It brings on many changes/And I can take or leave it as I please") that the lyrics had to be excised for the TV version of M*A*S*H, and the attempt to return it to cultural consciousness is well appreciated. (Actually, a great cover of the song already exists: the Manic Street Preachers did one way back in the early '90s.)
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