December 2008 Archives

So, this is Christmas. What have you done? Another year over.......oops, wrong song. Last week I wrote of my outrage at how the X Factor was turning a work of genius into just another karaoke song. Then I changed my tune somewhat.

There were a number of reasons for this, some of which were touched upon in the previous blog. The prevalent one was that more people would now be aware of both the song and in particular Jeff Buckley's version of it. With Buckley at number two my initial complaints now seem somewhat churlish.

At the time of writing last wk's blog I also hadn't heard the Alexandra Burke version. I have now and despite her apparent reticence about singing it (fuel to my fire) she actually doesn't do too bad a job. Amusingly I would not say the same about Leona Lewis's version of 'Run' which sits below the Hallelujahs. Leona is clearly the better artist but that run-through is just a cover-version by numbers, starting it in a dreary, plodding monotone so she can build to a very obvious crescendo. To be honest if that's the best she can do after having a year to make and release that version then she may be wildly over-rated.

The entire Hallelujah furore has also helped me to understand and appreciate the song more. Hearing it so frequently has transformed the lyrical complexity and Buckley's emotive reading of the nuances just confirms what a great artist he was. I went back to the deluxe version of 'Live at Sin-é' recorded in a small café where Buckley played a one-man show on a regular basis; it is such a magnificent recording that you can play it through headphones and almost feel that you're there back in the moment. Great music can do this, and this is truly great music.

I could touch upon the conspiracy theory I was alerted to by a reader of last wk's blog who pointed out that all the versions are on labels owned by SonyBMG, the same company that fund Cowell's Syco project but it might ruin the warm feeling of love I'm trying to project for the song - and it is Christmas after all.

For weeks I've been convincing myself that it must be some kind of joke; a cruel hoax perpetrated by arch-populist Simon Cowell in vengeance against those he probably considers to be music snobs. I was certain that there was surely no way the limited range of the X Factor winners would take on the beautiful complexity of a song like Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah'.

Despite my many cultural objections to Cowell and his ilk, his commercial nous has never been in doubt. He has successfully manipulated the medium of television to bolster his own wealth and status. Which of us - given the same opportunity - would not have done the same?

None of the ideas were particularly new - the variety/talent show is as old as TV itself, and Cowell would've been more than aware of the selling power of the medium and its capability to transform mediocrity into chart success. Famously Cowell had once researched which songs were most popular in pub karaoke sessions and had his artists (or micro-tv-celebs) record them for guaranteed chart cracking capability.

Where Cowell has excelled with X Factor is his 'control' of the package, his production company help to create the show and his record label gets to release music by the winner(s). The contracts that all contestants have to sign are also famously restrictive, meaning that none of them are able to capitalise on the fame they've been given - without Cowell's approval and share. If they're any good then long-term earnings will follow, but at the very least he'll have a couple of big hit singles.

The X Factor single is now generally accepted as a guaranteed Christmas Number One simply due to the vast quantity of Television time (and consequently 'celebrity' mag/paper coverage) dedicated to the programme and its participants. That this is a 'given' normally persuades Cowell to find an original song, from which he can derive some other associated benefit be it publishing royalties or other favours.

All of this evidence would suggest that a song such as 'Hallelujah' would be completely off his radar, it ticks none of the boxes. It's not that X Factor contestants haven't previously desecrated great songs, they've just normally steered clear of the credible in favour of the blatantly obvious.

Cover versions are a massively subjective territory, indeed it could be viably argued that either John Cale or Jeff Buckley's version of 'Hallelujah' are the definitive by which all others should be measured. Consequently my wrath is wasted on artists who misuse their talent recording hopeless versions of songs which I consider untouchable. This is not limited to wannabes; witness the peerless David Bowie's tragic version of The Beach Boys' 'God Only Knows' if proof is needed. You won't need to hear much of it before tears of laughter, disbelief and anger spill from your eyes.

Boy George stuck a male escort in handcuffs, hit him with chains and left him shackled to the wall. Sounds like an average day in the life. Let's face it, if he really wanted to torture the guy, he'd just have locked him in a room with Culture Club's greatest hits on repeat: maybe just the two songs - 'War (is stupid)' and 'Karma Chameleon' on permanent playback.

Please forgive my flippancy, in his defence George alleged that the escort was 'hacking into his laptop'. At this point all of those who rely on computers in order to earn a crust instantly forgave him.

For us home-workers, contractors and freelancers the laptop or PC is our lifeline. This effectively puts hackers, spammers and virus-spreaders on our shit list, somewhere alongside the Inland Revenue, red-tape wielding bureaucrats and traffic wardens. Some things are a given.

In common with most of those who spend upwards of 8 hours in front of a screen (daytime TV viewing doesn't count), I have about five or six different e-mail accounts, three of which I use on a very regular basis. One of these is so bulging with old e-mail that I simultaneously desire and dread the free-time to be able to clean it out.

The last time I gave this some thought I berated myself with the detail - 1978 should only be a year, not the quantity of mail in your inbox. Unfortunately there's now more than two thousand e-mails in there awaiting that down-time between Xmas and New Year when I might finally get the chance to purge it.

I suspect that almost 80% of the 2k+ have some important information in them somewhere, or info that was important at that point in time. Obviously there may be some duplication as we all now fire e-mail back and forth like some pointless, drunken conversation, but I do know where the delete button is, honest.

There's an old story, possibly apocryphal, about how the Americans spent a decade and thousands of dollars inventing a pen which would work in zero gravity situations and could therefore be used on their space missions. The Russians, meanwhile, used a pencil.

Even if it isn't true it is an indication of how we constantly strive to find a technological solution to a problem that really doesn't exist. Of course there are now countless innovations which once would have been beyond our wildest imaginings. Who would've thought, even 20 years ago, that we'd have the capability of carrying our record collections in our pockets? There was a time when I could barely climb over all of my vinyl to leave my bedroom, and I'm not joking.

Just because it can be done, doesn't mean it should be. Ipods play videos now of course, and I noticed someone watching a film on one very recently. I was on a London tube train at the time peeking over his shoulder amazed that he was viewing one of 'The Lord of the Rings' films. I can think of few epics less suited to a small screen - particularly when you consider that it wasn't even an ipod touch, it was one of the older/classic versions with the small screen - and he was watching the film in widescreen so it didn't even fill that.

I was also forced to wonder about the duration of his commute. It takes almost as long to watch one of those films as it did to make them. I accept that some people have a need to escape reality - particularly on a crowded train - but this seemed a little beyond. Yes, this technology allows you to do that, it doesn't mean that you have to.