It
was last Wednesday night. Game 5 of the NBA Finals was on
the tele, Yeungling Lager was flowing like the mighty Mississippi.
The Lakers were down 3 games to one and their elimination
seemed inevitable. Some said it wasn't over 'til the fat
lady sang and that night in  Detroit,
she did sing, well sort of.
The
Queen of Soul, a pioneer of R&B, an American pop legend,
an International music institution woddled to the middle
of the court at Detroit's Palace before the game. The crowd
was full of excitement as they anticipated an earth shattering
rendition of our National Anthem. Aretha opened her huge
pie hole, then proceeded to lip sync her
performance to a pre-recorded version.
Why
would a member of The Rock N Roll Hall of Fame, a person
known for her incredible voice, a multi-platinum selling
artist and one of the greatest vocalists of all time need
to resort to trying to trick millions of people on National
TV and the thousands in attendance? Why couldn't she just
sing? Has Aretha lost it? Sadly, and Heaven forbid she would
pass away someday soon, my memory of her would be from this
night, the worst performance of her career. Too bad Ray
Charles passed, he would have sang it with pride and confidence.
Why did she even show up? I would have respected the NBA
if they just said that they were playing a new version of
the Anthem recorded by Aretha. There's nothing wrong with
that. They could have played the song while showing pics
of our soldiers or something. Instead, they wheeled out
this 500 pound puppet and pulled some strings to make it
appear that she was singing. Little did we know that they
didn't even plug in the microphone.
And
then I wonder if she has ever heard the the song before.
She couldn't even lip-sync it! Maybe I'm just spoiled by
the performers of today who have quite frankly turn it into
an art. She was so bad that they only showed about 3 seconds
of her at the beginning. For the remaining minutes, they
panned the crowd, the celebs in attendance and the players.
It
was a sad day for music and an even sadder day for Jerk
Nicholson HA HA! |
