Among my favorite moments in each season of Glee have been the episodes that highlight song mash-ups. This season’s mash-ups for the most part lived up to their predecessors and one particular track stood out as probably the best mash-up Glee has ever done.
In an episode chock full of medleys, Mark Salling’s (Puck) take on Van Halen’s “Hot For Teacher” was the only solo track. I don’t think Salling gets enough credit for his vocal versatility. He showed a more vulnerable side of his voice earlier this season on a Foreigner track and, this week, we got to hear more depth and fullness in his singing. I think this was one of the better vocal performances we’ve gotten from him, actually. Cory Monteith (Finn) could also be heard on the track, and his voice pairs nicely with Salling’s.
On to the mash-ups, Idina Menzel (Shelby) and Matthew Morrison (Will) sang a medley Lady Gaga’s “You And I” and the Eddie Rabbitt/Crystal Gayle duet “You And I.” On paper, one wouldn’t think this could work, but surprisingly it does. I’m not sure that I’m quite sold on the pairing of Menzel and Morrison as duet partners, however. That said, I liked that Menzel had the bulk of the mash-up, because she really redeemed herself from season one’s recording of Gaga’s “Poker Face,” of which I was never a huge fan. Overall, I found the double dose of “You And I” to be a success.
I literally just got home from work and logged onto Twitter to find that the very talented Syesha Mercado (Idol season 7, Dreamgirls) had posted a cover of Adele’s “Someone Like You.” Check out her fantastic performance below!
The girl has got some pipes! Very few can do justice to an Adele song and she just did it seamlessly. Absolutely fabulous vocal performance, Syesha!
Panic! At The Disco covered the one and only Adele during their show last night in Ventura, CA. The band has been posting polls on Facebook for their fans to vote on which cover song they should perform each night at their show, and last night the band took their turn at performing “Rolling in the Deep”!
Check out the band’s performance below!
Not too shabby! What do y’all think of Panic!’s Adele cover?
The fabulous Adele appeared on the Jonathan Ross Show over the weekend, where she talked about her career “going really well” in the United States, drunk fans at her shows, and the recent VMAs. She also performed a gorgeous rendition of “Turning Tables” from her latest album, 21.
Last week after Javier Colon took the title as The Voice, some people claimed that Dia Frampton had been “robbed” of the title. As much as I love Dia’s voice, in my opinion, the only contestant on The Voice this season that was “robbed” of another chance to move on was Tyler Robinson.
After Tyler took on Patrick Thomas during The Voice’s battle rounds, Blake Shelton chose not to take a risk and advanced Patrick to the next round. For me, it was the disappointment of the season, because Tyler stood out as the stronger vocal contestant.
Fear not, Tyler tweeted that he will be releasing his debut original single, “Get Some” tomorrow, July 5! Take a listen to a short clip of “Get Some” below!
“Get Some” was written by Tyler, Joshua Horne (executive producer), and Phen Mas (producer). The track was additionally produced and engineered by Dan Whittemore. The track was mastered by Donny Baker at Studio 22 in Sun Valley, CA.
If you were to ask me which artist or band would be least likely to cover Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep,” I’m pretty sure Linkin Park would have been included on the list. Nevertheless, check out the band’s cover of “Rolling in the Deep” they recorded in Hamburg, Germany.
This is the power of a great and somewhat magical song. Everyone covers it. And hats off to Linkin Park, I think they did a pretty solid job with the song.
American Idol alums, Allison Iraheta (season eight) and David Hernandez (season seven) joined the masses who have already covered Adele’s hit song, “Rolling in the Deep” last night during a performance at The Parlor.
There have been a few extremely talented former American Idol contestants that have faded away from the spotlight after appearing on the show. For former contestants to stay on the fans’ radar, they have to really make a concerted effort, which is exactly what season 10 Top 24 contestant, Tim Halperin has been doing.
A lot of things have happened since I last spoke with Halperin earlier this year. He released “The Last Song” as a free mp3 download right after his run on Idol ended, which led to a unique opportunity with radio DJ, Kidd Kraddick. In between going on his Piano Tour and participating in Kidd Kraddick’s “Idol Got It Wrong” competition, Halperin raised $8,000 via Kickstarter to fund the intriguing and visually stunning music video for “The Last Song,” which premiered on June 6.
Watch Halperin’s music video for “The Last Song” below, and then check out my extensive Q&A session with the singer-songwriter which took place earlier this week about the making of “The Last Song” music video, his participation in “Idol Got It Wrong,” and what he thought about this season’s American Idol results.
How long ago did you actually write “The Last Song,” and how did it come to be the song to kick off your post-Idol journey with?
I wrote “The Last Song” about a year and a half ago. I was about three months out of a long term relationship, and I kind of came to that point where I was resolved to move. It’d come to that point where a lot of time you’ll see things or remember certain memories about that other person. Every day you’ll see certain things. So, it kind of got through that for a couple months, and I was finally ready to move on. I had that line going through my head, “This is the last song I’ll write for you,” because after being with someone for quite awhile you tend to write a lot of music about them. I had that line in my head and just started filling out different lyrics and different ideas for it.
That was one of the first songs that we recorded on my full length CD that will come out in the fall. It just turned out really well, and I think that that song gives people a good picture of who I am, and also that my music is very honest and straightforward. I like to throw all my emotions on the table, because I think people can relate best to honest music. That was kind of why I put it out first after American Idol. If you’re an Idol fan that maybe hasn’t heard my music before, you’ll get a good glimpse of who I am as a songwriter.
Did you always intend to turn “The Last Song” into a music video?
No, I hadn’t really thought about doing a music video. When I gave “The Last Song” out for free, in that first week it had almost 5,000 downloads. People really seemed to latch onto it, and it started getting radio play with this radio DJ in Dallas, Kidd Kraddick. It actually got enough radio play to put it on the Top 200 radio show, and it actually hit 148 a few weeks ago, which is really cool.
So I was like, “Man, people really relate to this song,” and so I called my buddy who did my music video for “She Runs” about a year ago. These two directors, my two friends Jonathan Combs and Joe Childress, I called them up and said, “I want to do a music video, I don’t have any money.” [laughs] Which they’re familiar with that, cause I didn’t have any money for the “She Runs” video. So, they started brainstorming and said that they wanted to do another video for me. They had a great concept, but they’re like, “This is going to take some money to do it.”
We decided to do a Kickstarter page where people could donate in return for different rewards like Twitter mentions and YouTube shout outs. And we raised the whole budget. I was so excited. We raised the $8,000 in less than 30 days.
Earlier today Glee’s current guest star, Jonathan Groff swung by MTV’s The Seven to talk about his return to the show, Lea Michele, and working on his fitness!
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