Friday, February 10, 2006

Improbable Aural Sensations

Has anyone heard William Shatner's cover version of Common People? It's crazy, but brilliant. He spends most of the song atonally growling the lyrics a la Leonard Cohen, and then later gets a bit more tuneful and energetic, before being joined by some other bloke.

But my favourite crazy celebrity song at the moment is Macarthur Park by (the) Richard Harris, which he did in the 1968. King David, Bob Dylan, Ira Gershwin, have all written some great lyrics, but surely few come close to this great chorus (it was written by Jimmy Webb):

Someone left the cake out in the rain
I don't think that I can take it
'Cause it took so long to bake it
And I'll never have that recipe again
Oh, no!