Customer Reviews

When Pigs Fly

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

At a glance,there are two ways to respond to this album...."Oh dear god,NOOOOO!",or "Hey,there's no William Shatner!". Either way,it's quirky and off-beat enough to be fun listening. But it is uneven.The choice of intersplicing slow songs with fast songs and a rap song,make listening a little bumpy.....I suggest programming your cd player appropriately. That said....let's get out the dissecting scapel.

Which songs aren't really such a surprise? Roy Clark singing "Wonderful World" is NOT a surprise. It's sung well,but not out of his range.( And it's from a 1991 compilation! ). Billy Preston's "Girls On Film",is another "no great stretch". I have no idea who The Connells are,so "Insane in the Brain",doesn't seem too out of their league. The same goes for Neanderthal Spongecake( WHO???),doing the overly covered "Get It On".

Which leaves us,with the cream: Devo doing a cool robo-version of "Ohio",not a great shock,but more of a "what took you guys so long?".( Considering they were at Kent State while the shooting took place!). But,it's great to hear Devo explore their political roots! Don Ho is also excellent! His creepy-lounge version of "Shock the Monkey" is great! ( And you can understand his vocals better than Peter Gabriel!). Hermans Hermits (with Peter Noone intact ) do a quite credible cover of "White Wedding". The Box Tops,whom I assumed were out of the music biz since the 60's,do a great "guy-version" of "Call Me". The Oak Ridge Boys cover of "Carry On My Wayward Son",is a stroke of genius! They have great close harmony vocals,so this was a great choice for them....even if their version is a little less hard rock.The Fixx doing "These Boots"....won't have Nancy Sinatra shaking in her boots,but it's good.And finally,there's the "Ying & Yang" of this cd.....it opens with the slow,almost karaoke version of "Unforgettable" with Ani DiFranco & Jackie Chan ( he could be the next Don Ho! ),and closes with the booty kicking "Dirty Deeds" by the Queen of 60's Teen angst....Leslie Gore! She rocks!!

There really aren't any William Shatner / "Rocket Man",or Leonard Nimoy/"Ballad Of Bilbo Baggins" performances here....even though you'd think there would be. It's a solid cd,and definitely for fans of the offbeat and oddball!

As a bit of schlock art, this wins, but it isn't as funny in execution as it reads on paper. Much of it doesn't exactly leap off the disc because some of these renditions take themselves too seriously. A switch of some of the artists to more known or displaced artists would have made this a cool in a I-still-carry-a-lunchbox-to-work kind of way: Roy Clark doing "What A Wonderful World" doesn't push out of the paradigm of the in-joke very much, but somebody like Alice Cooper playing it might have.

Not that there aren't some jewels here: Devo's "Ohio" is a great cover AND a great song, and Don Ho doing Peter Gabriel's "Shock the Monkey" fits so perfectly in with what I was expecting out of this record that I can't understand why the executive producer (Cevin Soling) didn't pursue this type of miscasting thorughout.

A good idea that doesn't quite live up to the potential of its own shlockiness. Quit being so serious and have more fun with it next time around.

You might howl with laughter when you read the track listing and artists, but the recordings themselves are quite professional and serious and not all silly. It's odd to think of Lesley Gore singing an AC/DC song, or Don Ho doing "Shock the Monkey," but it's not so odd to hear.

Many of the tracks on this CD are straight covers with little to recommend them unless you are a fan of the artist. A few covers do sparkle - and I have to say, while I wasn't surprised to hear Ani Difranco sing, I had no idea Jackie Chan has a good voice!

The CD title is misleading, because some of the recordings aren't at all improbable. The Devo cover of "Ohio" is long overdue, for example - Devo is friendly with Neil Young (they even made a movie together), and at least one of the Devos actually witnessed the National Guard's massacre at Kent State.

I admit I'm biased, but I do think "Ohio" is the most inspired of the bunch. It has extra lyrics and is quite different from the original (though still recognizable). I don't think there's much point in covering a song unless you can add something to it. Devo's "Ohio" is very new.

I bought this to hear Lesley Gore hear 'Dirty Deeds' and now I'm thinking I should have just tried to imagine it in my head. Like the previous comment, there's nothing really unusual about these covers so they don't even have that much of a 'so bad, they're good', or camp value. The covers are pretty unremarkable, bordering on boring. Oh well, live and learn.

"When Pigs Fly" is a neat CD, for the most part. The liner notes don't say anything about how it came about--you know, whether these songs were dug up from other places or whether the producers set out to get musicians to specifically cover songs you'd never think they would.

Still, it's enjoyable. The main reason I wanted it was that I'm a big Devo fan and "Ohio" is one of my favorite songs. I'm also into the Fixx, and "These Boots are Made For Walking" is a very unlikely tune for them to do. And that's probably what's going to drive anyone to this record: fandom of either the artists or the artists whose songs were covered. If you don't have the context, you probably won't dig it as much. Probably. Guessing about tastes is always a risky business.

For the most part, this lets musicians show their chops by taking a crack or two at songs they'd normally never do. Some really excel, but some don't. I'd hoped that Don Ho would do a more Hawaiian-sounding "Shock the Monkey," but he tried instead to retain the haunting sound of Peter Gabriel's original, which was kind of disappointing. On the other hand, Leslie Gore, of "It's My Party and I'll Cry if I Want To" fame did a killer rendition of AC/DC's "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap." I mean, it really works. That alone might be worth the price of the album--that is, if you know who AC/DC and Leslie Gore are.

When i picked this up, I had a chuckle, and thought it would be good for one listen, but after now having it for a few days, i am finding it addicting. The opening track of Ani DiFranco and Jackie Chan is wonderful. Ani is really a wonderful talent, and the pairing with Jackie is unforgettable. Shock the Monkey works for me, although you can hear Don Ho's age. White Wedding with Herman's Hermits i found to be revealing.
On some things, I thought they tried too hard to be funny (what do the Fixx add to Nancy Sinatra?), but hey, on some level this works. I think this not going to be a classic anytime soon, but it made me smile.

...or at least their band can. I heard about this album at [...], and it said that the producer who put the compilation together wanted "The Boys" to do an "Elvira" Country version of the Nine Inch Nails' "Closer", but they didn't like that idea. I'm glad they didn't because I really like their version of "Carry On, Wayward Son". And that's the one track that I bought.

If Jarmusch had Tarentino's musical love the soundtrack to his movies might sound like this. Requires a knowledge of the public personas of the cover and original performer for full ironic effect.

AC/DC -> Leslie Gore
CSNY -> Devo
Nancy Sinatra -> The Fixx
Anyone -> Ani DeFranco and Jackie Chan

Or maybe I've just been transported to the Twilight Zone...