I got an email from Bowie letting me know that a project he was working on is now ready for consumption. The project is called War Child: Heroes. It’s a benefit for child victims of war. Now, I’m all for the charity. But, this is a Bowie-influence blog, so I just want to look at what it is that we’re getting.
In keeping with the theme of this blog, I’ll start off with what is not the first song on the album. And, it shouldn’t be. ‘Heroes’ is covered by a band called TV on the Radio. I knew nothing about them before this, I know nothing now. The War Child site goes into great detail about the stars lending their songs, but little to nothing about the talent playing them. That strikes me as some kind of ego trip by the stars, but I doubt they had that much to do with it. Anyways, their version I really don’t like. The song builds to a climax and then lets you back down as do the lyrics. It’s also supposed to sound harsh, reflecting the realities of a seperated Berlin. Then amidst the harsh rhythym is an uplifting melody that wafts throughout the song. That is the hope inferred by the narrator. TV on the Radio just plays it like some elevator music. There is no harshness. There is no melody. There is no hope or betrayal of that hope. Promising to bring relief to children affected by war in the most unimaginably horrific environment anyone can imagine I would think would be more than enough inspiration to bring out some emotion for this song. But, these guys don’t get it. They sound like a bored Kraftwerk. This sucks. It really does. I think Bowie’s contribution to this effort would have been much better served getting Till Lindemann fronting Apocalyptica to do a full version of the song. Till gets it vocally, Apocalyptica gets it musically.
Beck doing Dylan was pretty decent. But, then it starts getting weird. Scissor Sisters do one of my favorite bands, Roxy Music. Out of my top 10 favorite Roxy songs, they do none of the above. They do the horrible “Do the Strand”. And, they do it as horriby as Roxy did. Why they picked this song is beyond me. Lily Allen does a fairly obscure The Clash song. I was sort of a Clash fan back in the day. I didn’t know this one. She does it ok. Duffy then does a watered down jazz sounding version of Live and Let Die. It just keeps getting weirder and weirder as it goes. It does however, finish off with an excellent, fun version of Call Me by Franz Ferdinand. That I think is definitely the hilite of this CD. I’m clueless how the performers were picked for the songs. I’m clueless to how the songs were picked. It’s like no one other than Bowie, Blondie, or McCartney even wanted this thing to succeed.
I’m so harsh on this thing because it could have done so much for so many people that need it. But, I don’t think it’s going to do much of anything due to the weak selection of songs and inappropriate mix of performers for the songs selected.
as it’s one of my favorites. In fact, it might be my favorite. What you don’t hear much is the original German version. I’d heard it a time or two. I loved the English version so basically forgot ‘Helden’ even existed. So, imagine my pleasant surprise when I read 
did. Probably one of my favorite remakes of 
. It’s a very industrial sound. Not the metal kind tho. In fact, if you listen closely to Bowie’s 1977 version, it has a modern industrial sound to it. The entire album at that time was too harsh for me. But one song stood out and used that harshness to effect. That sound probably wasn’t a Bowie creation, but Bowie was the first to use it that I was aware of at the time. Nowadays, it’s everywhere. ‘Heroes’ to say the least has morphed a hundred different ways since 1977. Now, thanks to