This is too much....

Come on guys... enough maligning of karaoke!!!

http://www.buyawardsandtrophies.com/resin-karaoke-toilet-trophy-p-2476.html?PID=4010397&refid=cj

Good website for karaoke articles

I found a Facebook page that is posting links to a lot of good karaoke articles. The Facebook page is called "MySpace Karaoke".  (I wonder how Facebook feels about that!??!)

I just took a little stroll through recent postings... they have a couple videos of folks in the Sugarland karaoke contest, a link to an article with karaoke tips for guys who can't sing, another link with tips on how to avoid karaoke embarrassment, and a link to a list of good karaoke tunes for Halloween.

I'm liking it. Thanks Kat!!

BTW... for information about the MySpace karaoke contest, visit a previous blog of mine, or have a look at their site.

Who do you want to sing karaoke with?

There was a recent poll in Singapore asking which artist you would most like to sing karaoke with. Naturally, my absolute first choice would be the Gypsy Songstress, who just happens to be my wife. It's all very convenient the way that works, cuz we do get a chance to sing karaoke together.  :)

But... I think their question had more to do with fantasy, and real pros rather than pro wannabees.

For me, I think I would have fun singing with Bette Midler. She has such a bawdy in your face style and I love her voice. Here is a pic of Bette. The one on the left is not me, by the way. It's Gladys Knight, without any Pips.

How about you?  What celebrity or performer would you like to join on a karaoke stage? Add a comment to tell me who you would like to get up on a karaoke stage with, and why.

Claudia Schiffer "admits" to singing karaoke

Believe it or not, supermodel Claudia Schiffer admitted in an interview that she sang karaoke at a party.

"I think I had a little too much to drink and it ended out with me being totally out of character and do a lot of karaoke... cuz I know me and I'm quite shy..."



Sigh.  Why do people need to make excuses to explain why they sing?  It isn't all that nasty of a disease, but it is catchy!

A few goofy karaoke videos

Karaoke for the deaf


Star Trek karaoke

Best songs of the 80s

Best of the 80's
I found out that I will be doing an 80's themed gig!  I have to be honest. I pretty much checked out of the music scene in the 80's. Career, kids... Tragically, life kinda got in the way of music for a while. I have my priorities straight now, thank god, but I needed a refresher course on what's good from the 80's.

So, I did a little Googling for "best music of the 80's". I picked out ten websites (see below) with lots and lots of songs  - most had a top 100 list. And I compiled votes. Here is a list of all the 27 songs that got at least 5 votes. So, if you happen to be coming to the Milwaukee Art Museum on Friday, Dec. 17, stop by for karaoke. Here is a list of songs you could sing.

Votes	Song	Artist
8	When Doves Cry	Prince
7	Billie Jean	Michael Jackson
7	Don't You Want Me?	Human League
7	Like A Virgin	Madonna
7	Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)	Eurythmics
7	Take on Me	A-ha
6	Every Breath You Take	The Police
6	Hungry Like the Wolf	Duran Duran
6	Livin' on a Prayer	Bon Jovi
6	Pour Some Sugar on Me	Def Leopard
6	Tainted Love	Soft Cell
6	Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go	Wham!
6	With or Without You	U2
5	Beat It	Michael Jackson
5	Don't You (Forget About Me)	Simple Minds
5	Everybody Wants To Rule the World	Tears for Fears
5	Faith	George Michael
5	Girls Just Wanna Have Fun	Cyndi Lauper
5	I Love Rock N' Roll	Joan Jett & The Blackhearts
5	Kiss	Prince
5	Material Girl	Madonna
5	Nasty	Janet Jackson
5	Sweet Child O' Mine	Guns N' Roses
5	Total Eclipse of the Heart	Bonnie Tyler
5	Walk Like An Egyptian	Bangles
5	Walk This Way	Run D.M.C.
5	You Shook Me All Night Long	AC/DC

Other posts in my "best songs" series
Crowd pleaser karaoke songs
Worst karaoke picks
Best slow dance songs of all time

Websites that I collected data from
http://hubpages.com/hub/Top-100-Songs-of-the-80s
http://www.liketotally80s.com/best_80s_music_videos.html
http://rateyourmusic.com/list/Clarkone68/top_100_songs_of_the_80s
http://www.nutsie.com/top100sradio/Top%20100%2080s%20Songs/2094767
http://www.digitaldreamdoor.com/pages/best_dance-80s.html
http://www.80sxchange.com/radio.htm
http://www.squidoo.com/100-greatest-songs-of-the-80s
http://mag.weddingcentral.com.au/music/songs/top1080s.htm
http://jeantop10.com/top100/72-music-charts/250-top-100-songs-80s
http://www.buzzle.com/articles/best-songs-of-the-80s.html

Heavy metal, horror flicks, and Jewish music

My wife sent me a link to a review of a new CD.  It's a collection of Jewish songs as performed by black singers. You can hear some clips from the CD, or buy it, from Amazon: Black Sabbath: The Secret Musical History of Black-Jewish Relations. My wife was not terribly impressed. She likes to hear Hebrew spoken (or sung) like someone who knows Hebrew.

I thought the name for the CD was a bit odd. Perhaps more than a little. I mean, the two words individually kind of fit, although I am never sure whether "black" is PC, and  the songs on the CD are not all songs for the sabbath. I guess "sabbath" could make one think about Jews, so maybe that's ok.

On the other hand, when you put the two words together, there are a lot of connotations that don't really fit with the CD.

Naturally, the title first made me think of the band Black Sabbath. Ozzy Osbourne was one of the founders of the group. I just don't recognize much of the music. I never was all that into heavy metal. The black-Jewish CD is not heavy metal, by the way.

But, now I gotta know where the band got their name from, cuz that's just part of my schtick, as shown by a few previous posts:
Where did AC/DC get their name?
Which came first, the doobie or the brother?

The band was formerly known as quite simply as "Earth". No wind. No fire. Just Earth. When they heard of another group by the simple name, they realized they had to change the name. As it turns out, the theater across the street from their practice space was running a Boris Karloff film called "Black Sabbath" when this all came out.

Osbourne wrote a song called Black Sabbath, and they later took on that name. This is just a technicality, but it sounds like the band was named after the song.

So, what about the film called Black Sabbath? The film is a collection of three unrelated horror stories starring Boris Karloff, closely following the Italian film The Three Faces of Fear. Neither Karloff nor the director of the original Italian film were Jewish, so where did the name of the film come from?

The director of the Italian version of the film, Mario Bava, had previously produced a popular movie called "Black Sunday". The directors chose "Black Sabbath" so as to ride on the coat tails of the previous movie. Other than the director, the two movies had nothing in common. I am guessing that there was a Jew in the studio who came up with the phrase Black Sabbath. Imagine that. A Jew in Hollywood.

Where did the phrase Black Sunday come from? Why do I say that the phrase probably came from someone who was Jewish?

Shabbat is the Jewish day of rest, the day of sabbath. It starts at sundown on Friday and continues until Saturday at sundown. Certain of these Shabbats are the special, such as Shabbat Chazon, also called Black Sunday. This Shabbat precedes a period of mourning called Tisha B'Av, which commemorates the day of the year that saw the destruction of two temples. This has been called the saddest day in Jewish history.

The Torah verse for that day (Isaiah 1:1-27)  is particularly gloomy.
People laden with iniquity!
Brood of evildoers!
Depraved children!
...
And every heart is sick.
From head to foot
No spot is sound:
All bruises, and welts,
And festering sores —

God does not sound all that pleased with Israel at this time. 
Your new moons and fixed seasons
Fill Me with loathing;
They are become a burden to Me,
I cannot endure them.
And when you lift up your hands,
I will turn My eyes away from you;
Though you pray at length,
I will not listen.

Wow. Heavy stuff.

But... to summarize my story.

The band heavy metal band Black Sabbath was named after the song Black Sabbath. This song was in turn named after the horror movie Black Sabbath. This movie was name after another horror flick, Black Sunday, to tie it to this previous money maker. The movie name Black Sabbath was also a reference to the gloomiest day in Jewish history.


I think if the folks who put together this CD would have done a little bit of research, they might have chosen a different name.