karaoke question - someone tried to tell me the backing tracks in most places are not original

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but I could swear that most were the real deal...would anyone know either way? I would be really sad if I couldn't tell, which I thought I could immediately...nothing worse than singing along with something "in the style of"

― douglas eklund (skolle), Friday, 15 September 2006 16:52 (nineteen years ago)

also, the actors in the videos are not the bandmembers either.

― Steve Shasta (Steve Shasta), Friday, 15 September 2006 16:55 (nineteen years ago)

in fact, most of the time the lyrics are wrong, too...(don't EVEN get me started on the hack job they did to "Radar Love")...

― hank (hank s), Friday, 15 September 2006 17:03 (nineteen years ago)

not original usually. usually some muddled synth arrangement.

― Charlie Howard (the sphinx), Friday, 15 September 2006 17:23 (nineteen years ago)

There's a vast range in quality in karaoke brands, as Blount and I discovered through our close association with the inner workings of Indie Rock Karaoke. Some brands use embarassingly awful midi renditions - the absolute nadir of which would have to be the batch of Jimi Hendrix done in this style. You haven't heard "Manic Depression" till you've heard it like that. Other brands have session recordings on a self-evidently tight budget, so that everything ends up sounding like a honky tonk bar band no matter what the arrangement of the original song. And there are, of course, top-tier slabs of karaoke that sound dead-on perfect like the original, even with weird synths and guitar tones and so forth. The Sunfly brand started out somewhere in midi-land but has gradually improved as far as I can tell, and there was one outfit that consistently hit them out of the park....

Words-wise, of course, it's a complete crapshoot. See also: this:

http://static.flickr.com/33/218221205_5ea136a544.jpg

― Doctor Casino (Doctor Casino), Friday, 15 September 2006 20:05 (nineteen years ago)

sound choice consistently yr top choice in karaoke

the hendrix karaoke that was nothing but very very sparse seinfeld bass still holds a place in my heart though.

― j blount (papa la bas), Friday, 15 September 2006 21:00 (nineteen years ago)

The midi-file arrangement / derangement of Slayer's "Angel Of Death" (that seems to be in every karaoke box in every Japanese city from what I could tell) is possibly even better than the original.

― Matt #2 (Matt #2), Friday, 15 September 2006 21:06 (nineteen years ago)

Napoleon and Reggs? Ha! blount, why didn't you use that as your dj name?

― Run Ruud Run (Ken L), Friday, 15 September 2006 21:13 (nineteen years ago)

Karaoke backing tracks are very rarely original. They are good carbon copies though.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Friday, 15 September 2006 21:15 (nineteen years ago)

they made "teenage rebel of the week" = "listen to the love weep"

OK, let's just this turn this into our "favorite lyrics screwed up by karaoke" thread. Aside from "Napoleon and Reggs" (blount: "Coming this fall on ABC!") my favorite for some reason has always been turning "Soy un perdidor" into the even more mopeish and Gen-X-y "So dependent on!" There was something really wrong in "Some Might Say" too, but I never wanted to put anybody through me singing that again in order to double-check it.

― Doctor Casino (Doctor Casino), Friday, 15 September 2006 23:17 (nineteen years ago)

From "It's the End of the World as We Know It": "Birthday party, cheesecake, jelly beans, prune."

― lindseykai (lindseykai), Saturday, 16 September 2006 17:13 (nineteen years ago)

There were a ton of minor goofs in "It's The End of the World" when I did it a few weeks ago, but in careening past them I didn't really take note. You'd think these companies would spring for official lyrics sheets while they're buying the rights to the songs!

― Doctor Casino (Doctor Casino), Saturday, 16 September 2006 18:40 (nineteen years ago)

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