covers.

Rod Stewart.

for.

Enterprise.

Theme.

Weirdest.

News.

Yet.

 

And I still say "Planet Hell" is the 16th set.
 

I honestly have nothing much to contribute. I've never heard this song (since I never saw "Patch Adams") but I know that Rod Stewart isn't one of my musical tastes. However, I do know that Russell Watson is a gifted singer. That with (what I hope comes to pass) is an arrangement of the song by the composer-in-residence on Enterprise might be a good combination. Wait and see.
 

[ August 31, 2001: Message edited by: Harry ]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Siegfried:
Okay, maybe I stand alone on my opinion of Russell Watson's singing abilities. After all, I'm the same person that considers Celine Dion to be a gifted singer and Britney Spears and N'Sync to be talented musical acts.

---

indeed
 

So, it was my last day at work today and during a particularly slow period (well, historical research is rarely frantic) I dl'ed, largely to my dismay, a full mp3 of this, erm, song, and transcribed the first two-thirds of the lyrics...

quote:

---

It's been a long road
Getting from there to here.
It's been a long time
But my time is finally here.
And I can feel a change in the wind right now,
Nothing's in my way.
And they're not going hold me down no more
No they're not going to hold me down.

Cause I've got faith of the heart
I'm going where my heart will take me
I've got faith to believe
I can do anything.
I've got strength of the soul
And no one's gonna bend or break me
I can reach any star.
I've got faith.
I've got faith.
Faith of the heart.

It's been a long night
Trying to find my way
And throught the darkness
Now I've finally had my day
And I will see my dream come alive at last
I will touch the sky
And they're not going hold me down no more
No they're not going to change my mind

Cause I've got faith of the heart
I'm going where my heart will take me
I've got faith to believe
I can do anything.
I've got strength of the soul
And no one's gonna bend or break me
I can reach any star.
I've got faith.
I've got faith.
Faith of the heart.

---

And so on.

Anyway, the first consideration is the fact that the song will have to be severely abridged to stick into an intro, unless Mr. Watson sings it Yakko-style. The first verse and chorus is just short of a minute, so let's assume for a minute that's what gets used.

Let's get things out in the open right away. The song sucks. I can take Rod Stewart when he's making a genuine ass of himself ("If you think I'm sexy.") or when the song is so damn catchy it was successfully marketed in a diaper commercial ("Forever Young."). But this is crap... and we all know that when you add one negative number (Stewart's sandpapery vocals) to another (Trite "I believe I can fly" lyrics) you get a bigger one.

But the song is not beyond repair by any means. It just needs to be filletted down to nearly nothing and then repatched and it should do nicely. Of course, when one deals with such significant changes, one can only wonder if it be better to go with something else instead.

Anyway, the lead-in verse is light-years better sounding than the chorus, both in terms of lyrics and music. It is very, very, very Enterprisey as-is, if you take it as a statement about the status of humanity as the series being set when it is and accompany it with the aforementioned historical montage. (It could be immeasurably improved, though, if the lyrics are tweaked so that instead or I/my it was we/our...) On the music side of things, the lead-in is downright listenable, or in other words you don't say "keep this adult easy listening shit away from me" and cover their ears when it begins. If McCarthy us arranging it, I anticipate a more orchestral string sound rather than the present guitar, which ought to work fabulously.

The real vile and putrid pigswill is the chorus. Because, well, what the fuck is "Faith of the Heart," other than a smarmy artificial term pulled out songwriters' aft orifices when composing such songs. Is it self-confidence? Religious feverance? Monkey worship? Michael Bay music video interfering with one's cardiac valves?

So, and this is what I mean about filetting the song, ditch, well, the title line.

Which leaves a rather gaping hole.

Hell if I know how to patch that up.

As for the rest of it? Well, while it reads hokily enough, it's even worse with Stewart crooning it as if the song was meant to be some kind a sincere message to the world. I'm a little unclear whether the hokiness will be a masked somewhat or made even more pronounced by the operatic style... how stuff like "I've got strength of the soul" comes out is crucial. The recurrence of "Faith" is especially irritating, because the lead-in verse is such a close match to the Enterprise premise and we get get "faith" thrown at us which has dick all to do with Star Trek. Are we meant to get the impression Archer's flying his ship to see the galaxy on the seat of his pants because it's his destiny to triumph no matter what the odds?

The melody in the chorus is pretty passable, too, and certainly inferior to the lead-in, but again a bit more texture could vastly improve it. It better.

So, yeah, pretty disappointed, but I can't advocate a "Wait and See" policy for everyone else and not me, so I'll pass final judgement after I've heard the Watson version a few times. must be the
Anyway,

And, FWIW, this my suggestion lyric-wise as it stands presently.

quote:

---

It's been a long road
Getting from there to here.
It's been a long time
But our time is finally here.
And I can feel a change in the wind right now,
Nothing's in our way.
And they're not going hold us down no more
No they're not going to hold us down.

Cause |||expletive deleted|||
I'm going where my heart will take me
I've got |||expletive deleted||| to believe
I can do anything.
I've got strength of the soul
And no one's gonna bend or break me
I can reach any star.
I've got |||expletive deleted|||
I've got |||expletive deleted|||
|||expletive deleted|||.

---

[ August 31, 2001: Message edited by: The_Tom ]