Comments on: How to shoot down someone who outdrew ya

By: Pete Baran

Pete Baran — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 17:03:32 +0000

Except this year there is no great groundswell for Miley’s orginal!

By: Tom

Tom — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:49:55 +0000

Here we go again!

By: Tom

Tom — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 13:23:12 +0000

I will admit my eyebrow raised when I read in the paper this morning that Burke, Buckley and Cohen share a record label…

By: poohugh

poohugh — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 13:19:22 +0000

Would it be horrible to think that Columbia/Sony are behind this facebook group?

Not wanting to sound like a paranoid Commie or anything; this facebook group does have the pong of the Bring Back Wispa group created by Roger Cadbury.

By: wichita lineman

wichita lineman — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:41:30 +0000

Re 4: Just how big was Laughing Len’s debt? He must have raked in a fortune from UK performances alone this year. At the Albert Hall a few weeks back I thought it was more than a little like Chris Rea fronting Dire Straits, and can’t for the life of me see why everyone suddenly adores him. Cartwheeling backing singers are all well and good but super-slick arrangements aren’t what drew me to songs like Seems So Long Ago Nancy. He looks sweet on stage, I suppose – I missed the grubbiness.

By: Pete Baran

Pete Baran — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 15:17:38 +0000

And the BBC have rolled in on this too with their Hallelujah Quiz:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7783704.stm

By: Tommy Mack

Tommy Mack — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 13:20:26 +0000

Still either way it’s a nice shower of royalties for laughin’ Len’s suit against his crooked manager!

By: Geoff

Geoff — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 23:13:27 +0000

Any kind of campaign is doomed to failure: “Mad World” had no reality TV competition and the JCB song was knocked off the no.1 spot by Shayne Ward.

Even if it wasn’t pointless, I think these kind of campaigns are pretty sad – if enough people genuinely liked the record in the first place they’d have bought and it would have been a hit. And buying to get one over on Simon Cowell is pointless anyway as (1) it won’t work and (2) even if it looked likely too, it would probably just please him as it all adds to the X Factor publicity machine. The very act of boycotting / campaigning against Alexandra’s version therefore just adds fuel to the X Factor machine.

Aside from all that, on a personal level, the idea of any song being ‘untouchable’ is laughable.

By: rosie

rosie — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 20:11:01 +0000

Actually I suggested a campaign for Cohen's version in another place (in response to somebody else advocating the Buckley campaign.) Cohen's is the best version by far as it is the only one that can contain the great depth of the song, but of the alternative versions I have a soft spot for Rufus Wainwright's. Hallelujah! isn't even the outstanding track on the Various Positions album (my vote goes to Dance Me To The End Of Love), and the album is one of Cohen's weakest.

By: Simon

Simon — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:05:27 +0000

Interesting that nobody’s suggesting a similar campaign for Cohen’s version. Maybe some legends, in both senses of the word, are more beyond the pale than others.