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When Gwyneth Paltrow Sings, Ears Ache

It’s always an immensely sad moment in entertainment history when a movie actor steps forward to pretend, and then claim in an unfortunate public, on-the-record, performance, that they can sing when they cannot.  We last saw that sort of faux singing in Joaquin Phoenix’s Johnny Cash movie and now, today, we have the same inglorious example in Gwyneth “The Goop” Paltrow’s incredibly bad turn in her new movie, “Country Strong.”  Here is a screenshot of Paltrow recently “singing live” at the Country Music Awards.  She closes her eyes throughout most of the song as she tries to land the right notes in a simple melody.  Gwyneth sings.  We cringe.

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Tom Petty’s Live Anthology on iTunes LP

One of the first things I do each morning is login to iTunes, check for any new Apps, and then see what’s new in music.  I was thrilled this morning to see a new Live Anthology from Tom Petty in the new “iTunes LP” format was released today.

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The Evidence Audio Cables Review

If you get into music full-bore to make up for 20 years of lost time, your effort quickly begins to ascend into the monetary stratosphere as costs pile up to bowl you over in that everlasting and neverending chase for “that sound.”  The latest example of my overweening ear interest is demonstrated in my new obsession with Evidence Audio
amp, speaker and guitar cables.  This is my story.

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Nine Nine Nine

The Beatles re-arrived yesterday, in their ongoing, 40-year, British Invasion of melody, mind and matter. Most of the good radio stations in New York City played hour-long Beatles song cycles yesterday in honor of their latest remastered music mastery.

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American Idol Tune Dropping and Tone Deafness

I am a big fan of American Idol, but I cannot get over the fact that so few of the contestants that make it to Hollywood can carry a tune and how so many contestants — and fans! — are tone deaf.

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Madonna and Melody

In Salon the great critic and intellectual Camille Paglia rips apart Madonna for being creepy and old and trying to incorrectly recapture her angst and youth instead of blazing a path that matches her temperament and established philosophy of performance:

Even allowing for the fact that she must strenuously maintain her hipness for a busy husband 10 years her junior, Madonna is starting to morph into the mature Joan Crawford of “Torch Song,” still ferociously dancing but with her fascist willpower signaled by brute, staring eyes and fixed jawline. In cannibalizing her disco diva days, Madonna runs the risk of turning into a pasty powdered crumpet like the aging Bette Davis in “What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?” Will she become a whooping Charo shaking her geriatric hoochie-coochie hips on TV talk shows? Or should we expect a sudden, grisly collapse from glowing beauty to dust, like Ursula Andress as the 2000-year-old femme fatale in “She”? Too hungry to connect to the youth market, Madonna goes on childishly using naughty words and flipping the finger (as onstage at Live 8 last summer). Marlene Dietrich, her supreme precursor, knew how to preserve her dignity and glamour.

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Fiona Apple Turnover

The enchanting Fiona Apple has turned over a tricksy new musical leaf with the release of her latest album, Extraordinary Machine. The machine is she and extraordinary she is! Fiona’s music on this new album is no longer solely glum and gloomy like her previous public efforts. She now presents us with a sexy curiosity and a jaunting, lilting, melodic sense that is bright and blossoming in a dull Pop music world.

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