Monday, October 26, 2015

My Music Monday

Thank g-d - the last Opposite Day Cover.

Again, this might be a stretch of the "lesser known" original.

Today's selection might have something more to do with age than anything else. Or how gay you are. Or both.

As the song"Venus" goes (not the Frankie Avalon song), of course I knew the Shocking Blue version. The original from back in 1968 - when I was just a lad.

I was well into my 20s {shut up} before I realized the singer was a female! It never occurred to me that the vocal was anything but male. I stand corrected. I am also correct that she is a horrible horrible lip syncher .

But in my 20s, Bananarama covered the song on their album True Confessions. For what limited success the group had on their first two disks, the single and video for "Venus" was made for MTV and gay bars. I mean - let's be honest.

While their cover was fine, it did set off on how to copy the sound for their next few albums - and they became tedious. At least before, they mixed it up with a ballad, ska, Swahili etc. Now they just tried to appease the 12" extended play buying fags.

I know. I was one of them. At least for a bit. And two of the three are still angling that same market 30 years later. Sad. Sad. Sad.

But in their own ways, I like both versions. I doubt Shocking Blue ever meant for it to be a club hit - as I never saw Austin Powers or Mrs. Kensington dance to it.

On a side note - my friend Jon (nor his boss) used to change words to certain songs. This one was no different. All I can remember - and maybe all that there was - was:

"g-d on a mountain top / hanging by a silver nail / and Jesus was his name...."

Oh - it's not like I wasn't going to hell before that. Calm down.




5 comments:

anne marie in philly said...

the original "venus" was a GIRL singer? well blow me down!

the original is spooky like halloween; the bananarama version is more a dance tune.

Bob said...

I'll take the original any day ... and I never knew it was a female singer either!

Anonymous said...

Has to be the Shocking Blue original every time. The word groovy springs to mind.
JP

Fearsome Beard said...

Nope, didn't know it was a woman either. Knock me over with a feather. I like them both as well. Grew up with that one I thought was a guy and danced my little gay ass off to Bananarama's remake as an adult ( if you can call me in my 20s an adult).

Erik Rubright said...

I'm definitely partial to Shocking Blue's original version. And how did you not know she was a girl? She has that 1960s female blues singer sound.

And I'm glad you made it all the way through Opposite Day Covers this month!