during each year, be it calendar or just a measured point of month to the following same, i will purchase approximately three quarters of a million tapes (discs) off of charity shops. well, give or take that figure, look you see. mostly, i suppose, i could just write in this blog of finds there, but that might make this even all the more boring that it presently is. yes, think about that. now that i think, actually i have written of such things, recently, kind of.
every now and then, like now (for instance), i stumble across a disc which must be written of. and not in a particularly good way. recently, rather than in the future the past, i took a chance on a disc called a tribute to duran duran. my focus was the name, for if it were a tribute then surely it would be that they were to praise Simon, Nick and a wonderful variation of Taylors. quite wrong, was i. i was.
should you have a love, or certain level of affection, for things what are duran duran, you may wish to cease reading. nothing beyond this point shall please you. it may even make you angry, distressed or very possibly quite cross. how someone could have such a dark level of hatred in their heart to have constructed this is rather scary.
certainly, yes, sure, the main point or purpose of this was to make a financial donation to a charity in return for an item. that's how it works, after someone or other donated the item. i do not wish for any idea that i regret the cost, £1, is begrudged or regretted. actually, rather better that i bought this at whatever price, so that i may destroy it, and prevent others being polluted with this vile slur.
on seeing the name "mojo" on the back, i went oh, right, ok, this must have been a free cd given away with mojo magazine. which would have explained why i had heard of barely any of the acts paying homage (allegedly) to things of duran, except the one abba tribute act of some note. no, actually mojo turns out to have been an actual, presumably proper record label that went ahead and did this. by that i mean arranged for it to be recorded, pressed, then marketed and sold in the hopes of making money.
what's the main issue here? as in, why is this so bad, what makes this an obscenity and crime? really horrid, truly awful, darned bad "versions" of songs. near enough all of them sound exactly the same, and that's not good, at all. for some reason "tribute" translated as making all of them sound like rancid, poor man's untalented green day cover band outtakes. a personal favourite, View To A Kill, starts off reasonably well, then a decision is made to screech the lyrics high pitched and ridiculously fast.
issues with duran duran, i can get. over the years, and you can look for instances on this blog if you wish, i have had reason to quarrel with simes, or simon, or simon le bloody bon, for his futile efforts to borrow (ahem) my look and style and pass it off as his own. but ultimately there is nothing but love for duran from me, and most of the world. everyone in the world except everyone bar the abba tribute act, bjorn again, that was involved in this record.
just, you know, why? for what reason would you do this? how can you possibly hate someone so much to invest so much money and energy into a false, misleading tribute to express your contempt? surely it would be better for your own health, your psychology and (certainly) the world to just ignore a band you don't like, rather than produce such venom and bile?
there's no way i could see myself doing this to a band, no matter how much i hated them. nearest closest, i suppose, like the overwhelming majority of the people on the planet (including some members of the actual band) would probably be spandau ballet. but, you know, even if i did go and make a horrible record paying "tribute" to them, it would fail, i suppose. it's called the hadley paradox. getting a bunch of people to do awful, tripe, obscene covers of spandau ballet songs would not work as a statement of contempt, for the fact that no members of spandau are on the cover versions means that they are in fact immediately better than the spandau ballet originals. a no win.
my hope, or wish, is that someone somewhere involved in this monstrosity was arrested. unlikely, of course. the police these days seem only interested in arresting people who "cause upset" on meaningless social media echo chambers. well, no, in america they seem to also kill people in broad daylight and wonder why so many have an issue with this. trust me, i know for a fact that the police certainly don't go arresting cricket players (despite valid treason laws existing) no matter how many times you call the constabulary, trust me. unpunished, this crime appears to have gone, even though the guilty are all listed in the linear notes and on the back of the (hideous) artwork.
from what i recall, yeah, this came out just after duran duran did thank you, in which they paid homage to various favourites. true, not everyone liked it, but i did. had it been that the bands they covered responded with duran covers, then fair enough. but no valid reason i can see exists for the people what did the songs here to be so cruel to duran.
be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment