Flo Rida is currently dominating the charts with “Right Round,” his (and Dr. Luke’s) re-imagining of Dead or Alive‘s “You Spin Me Round (Like A Record).” But it’s not just his two-hit wonderdom that makes me think he might be the ultimate pop star for this crazy time. Billboard asked him how he came around to using the Dead or Alive track, and his basic response was that his A&R guy at Atlantic asked him to use the song, so he did. While that’s likely been great news for whatever plastic surgeon Pete Burns sold his songwriting share to for services rendered, I had to wonder why the A&R guy didn’t think of what could be plundered from the Atlantic catalog before providing revenue to Dead or Alive’s then-label Epic. Since I’m in the giving spirit, here are five tracks from the house that Ahmet built that Flo Rida should consider in the near future.
Scarves. Scantily clad ladies. Flashy cars. A strategically placed woman on a pool table. Andrew “Dice” Clay as a leering bouncer. Yes, Hinder’s video for “Use Me” brings back all the good-time video tropes of 20 years ago–but if that description entices you, you’ll have to click through to see it, since it’s sprung from the bowels of Universal Music Group, which apparently needs every last bit of banner-ad revenue it can wring out from the sidebars of YouTube’s pages. In an effort to provide a contextual embed, after the jump please find a clip of Skid Row performing “Big Guns” at the Moscow Music Peace Festival in 1989. Seriously, “Use Me” is little more than a slightly updated, less hooky rewrite of the opening track from that band’s debut album, and I’m kind of surprised Sebastian Bach hasn’t taken to the blogs to complain about this fact yet.
The second season of Gone Country, the “anyone can be a Nashville star–especially people who have already been famous once” competitive reality show on CMT, is filming in Nashville right now! Aspiring amateur paps in the 615 should be on the look out for Sebastian Bach, Irene Cara, Mikalah Gordon (who came in 11th on season four of American Idol–Amanda Overmyer, there’s hope for you yet!), Jermaine Jackson, former Eminem target Chris Kirkpatrick, Lorenzo Lamas, and Sean Young. Why this show is really necessary or “funny” is still up for debate, given that Cascada’s version of Rascal Flatts’ “What Hurts The Most” was only the most recent example of the ever-shrinking boundaries between country and every other pop genre today. But hey, I guess everybody needs a job, and this season of the show will pair each contestant with two songwriters for country-songwriting purposes. Which made me wonder: what would happen if some of the contestants recast their own work for the show?
Oh, Sebastian Bach. I understand why you would think that the group currently touring as Skid Row–i.e. the band that doesn’t have you in it–is “wrecking the [band’s] name worse than can ever be wrecked.” More »
The Sebastian Bach-less Skid Row has added Cinderella guitarist Jeff LaBar to its lineup; he’ll fill in for original guitarist Dave “Snake” Sabo, thus pushing the band below the “50% original members” line. More »
Carrie Underwood sings Skid Row’s “I Remember You” at a concert over the weekend–quite well. Clearly, what the next season of American Idol needs is “power ballad” night, if only to get Sebastian Bach back on Tuesday-night TV once in a while. More »
Welcome to another edition of On The Shelf, Idolator’s every-Monday look at Tuesday’s roster of new albums. It’s another slow, holiday tie-in-laden week, and you’ve already heard us go on about what’s undeniably the week’s biggest release: My Chemical Romance’s The Black Parade. After the jump, we present our take on new albums by John Legend, Brooke Hogan, and Skid Row.
