Like A Prayer, Madonna, 1988.
The ultimate 'roke song, for reasons not limited to & actually somewhat beside its merits as an ultimate pop song. I would like to live in a world where this song replaces "Happy Birthday" when sung to the most top quality human beings. The universally known Madonna-ness & gospel qualities of this song make the finale group sing experience natural & joyful & commemorative every time. For best results, honor the beginning with a poised pass the mic & intro into "feels... like.... HOme." Let the chorus simmer for which ever core singers are feeling it, don't jump the gun on echoes like "I'll! take-you-theh!-ere," add desperate prayer-like dramatics to accompany the verses that mention God, & own the lyric mishaps that happen around the "muse-to-me" line. By the end, it's not unlike a band of shameless angels sighing in unison, as you see here.
This video features Val & several other core roke partners in a typical finale in Room 13 at Duet 48 during visit of her friend Danielle. Out-of-town guests are generally great roke company & can awaken us to the rare gift of private room roke houses in NYC. Notice that the lyric screen & the mics are mere accessories here. What results at this point is an awkward-glorious share circle of private enjoyment. Clapping, closing affections, half-thought out dance moves, use of alcoholic beverage as faux-mic, two leaning mouths on one mic - all typical.
Finale from Danielle Ashby on Vimeo.
-G
To post a comment on such an absolutely perfect appraisal of the ideal “Like a Prayer” karaoke session is almost sacrilegious. But for karaoke, it becomes something like an alternative Gospel: something you can deny if your heart tells you to, but that is nevertheless compelling in its own right.
ReplyDeleteThis song is an ultimate karaoke classic. It can start with one person furtively singing into a badly tuned mic, and climax with a 20-man chorus to the glory that is music, the only remainder of mankind’s own magic in this era of technologically defined masterpieces.
Youmust divorce yourself from your opinion of this song as a piece of music to be consumed, because you’re doing karaoke now, and you are assuming the role of the artist, whether you like it or not. And you will like it when you realise how much fun Madonna must have been having behind the mic in some studio in the nineteen-fucking-eighties (however old that makes you feel) and you connect with your fellow karaokees like you never thought possible, through the medium of that overlong and over-earnest song that never quite made it onto her latest greatest hits CD.
And you will fucking love it. And that is why you fucking love karaoke. And that is when you will never look back.