Karaoke Forums

For those of you who don't watch Family Guy, Buzz Killington is a fellow who bores people wanting to drink beer and have a good time by showing them etchings or telling them the story of how cornmeal came to be.

There is always a Buzz Killington every time we go out. One woman sings Crazy by Patsy Cline, and not very well I might add. Or someone will sing I Will Always Love You. Even What a Wonderful World by Louie Armstrong done well seems to kill any momentum the show had going. Songs like this usually get polite applause if any, unless MAYBE the crowd is mostly older people. People want to hear songs that are fun or energetic, not songs recommended for people who don't respond to Ambien.
Seriously, after maybe doing this twice and getting the same reaction I don't think I'd sing that song again. YET THEY DO.

Ok, I'll get off my soapbox now.

karaoke provides comfort... people sing in that comfort. What's comfortable for them may not be quite so easy to take for anyone else.

But more than that, Karaoke is for the INDIVIDUAL. Hey, if you like Opera, go for it. I don't have to like it, more often than not it's a musical exercise that showcases talent. But so do Diva type songs, and I can't stand them either!

But the singers that DO like them, hey, it's their five minutes with the microphone.

Let them do it.

It's our job as KJs to bring the energy back after a zzzzzzz snore has hit the room. With our personality, with fading in mix music... that's what makes a Great KJ BETTER... the ability to recover from the ballad he!! nights, the acid rock lovefests, the country bumkin hoe downs... You gotta know how to pickup a room! And FAST!

At least Crazy is three minutes long.

What I hate are the 5-6 minute droners, some of which might even be well received by the crowd on the first notes. I have taken The Wreck of The Edmund Fitzgerald, Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad, War Pigs, PBTDL, and American Pie out of my books. I would love to find a four-minute version of Total Eclipse of the Heart.

If I smoked, I'd probably like them. Start Wanted Dead Or Alive and I'd be thinking "Smoke break!" That to me is a real killer in places where smoking isn't legal any more, having half the audience outside.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I've found it varys on the venue and type of crowd. The "buzz killers" have various names ..BALLAD HELL ..is one . BUT on the flip side .... You don't want to sing CRAZY or WONDERFUL WORLD in a show that so far has been YOUNG, HIP, ENERGETIC .... At least you don't want to be the 50 year old singing these songs in a YOUNG PLACE ! MY advise to singers if you want to get the CROWD going

If your OLD sing something NEW and dated
If your YOUNG ...sing something OLD and CLASSIC

Works everytime to gets peoples attention.

Karaoke used to be a blend and people accepted it. People do the songs that they love that make them feel good. The energy wasn't killed, just delayed for all of a whopping few minutes. There were times I wished "Crazy" wasn't in karaoke books but sometimes someone gets up there and actually does it well. But in no case did I ever think it was cause to not have a good time. It was all part of the deal.

Now it seems the shows are evolving into segregated types of shows. They are either constant high energy young shows with sound that some of the older ones won't tolerate or oldies shows where the young ones are afraid to sing their headbangers (with exceptions at each show but still mainly segregated). I prefer the blends myself but think we are in an era of a different trend. There is a lot more pressure on the KJ to keep it going. I used to like to get crazy and dance at karaoke but I never felt that I had to be amped up at every second in order to enjoy myself. Part of it was talking to friends and keeping up the enthusiasm and support toward other singers. Now it all seems to fall on the KJ.

Songs like "I Will Always Love You" and many other Whitney Houston songs enjoyed amazing popularity and became familiar to a lot of wanna-be singers. So they not only get to sing a song that is very familiar to them, but that is familiar to others as well. Maybe that's why those get sung often, even though as we know WH's voice is amazingly difficult to duplicate. I know most females that sing songs like "Crazy" and the others mentioned don't always have the pipes or style that the original artists do/did, but that's just part of the downside of the business.

At my show last night there were three groups of people who had never experienced karaoke before - not as spectators or as singers. I am fortunate to have an amazing group of singers frequenting this show and they commented on the wonderful variety of music they heard - that it truly was a 'free concert' - the one singer who may have fit in that first category didn't stay for the entire evening.
Makes those BK songs disappear thankfully.

Leopards observation is interesting and has some truth to it. I've been to old shows and to young shows. Most shows I've seen still have a blend of ages and song selection

What is often forgotten is this



So when someone sings in the shower who are they singing for? Maybe everyone who sings doesn't care about the audience or how it reacts?

Cracks me up to hear someone who considers themselves a karaoke host or kj openly admitting to removing songs from a book. Two of which I happen to like, btw. I've had requests for me to sing "Two out of Three" because the audience member LOVED the song, and wanted to hear someone nail it, as opposed to butchering it. PBTDL is yet another, when done PROPERLY is actually quite pleasant to hear. I personally hate the song "The Rose", but when my friend Jeannie sings it, I shaddup and listen, and she F(n) NAILS it... it's a pleasure to hear it!!

But too many times, it's the drunk warbling voices that will ruin a good song. I always loved "The Wreck of the Edmond"... but do admit its' long, and I doubt in a casual atmosphere it would go over very well. I go for a Soda Break (don't smoke) when I hear certain songs... but it's NOT about ME. It's about the singers, dammit!

Matt I loved your post.

I have a variaty of all kinds of songs sung from rap to country, oldies to current. I agree with the seperation of younger crowds and older crowds, but for myself I have a lucky mix.

The random buzz kill song is going to happen if we like it or not. It to me is just a part of karaoke. People are pretty tolerant of it as long as it isn't buzz kill song after buzz kill song.

I personally don't sing much any more unless the crowd wants me to. Once in a while they'll gang up me and want me to sing "I'll Always Love You". Aaaarg! I'd rather sing something more upbeat and current. Sometimes I can get out of it by saying I have to many singers. It's my own personal buzz kill song.

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[shadow=pink][glow=deepskyblue]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
[updown]~*~ MONKEY BUSINESS KARAOKE~*~ [/shadow][/updown][/glow]

But it isn't the person that nails it that does that type of song most often, it is the one who is browsing the book and thinking "I like that song!" Then they get up and do it, and sometimes abandon it in the middle.


I just choose not to offer those songs in my book. Just like I choose not to offer many songs that I actually have -- I have a self-confessed "Dummy Book" with many of the songs I offer pulled from it. For instance, I list 8 Celine Dions while I have 27. 8 Mariah Carey when the number is really 16. By their names is a little asterisk that means "more songs available from this artist, see host". The same as the asterisk by Meat Loaf, for whom I list one song (IDAFL). In my area, we have about 2 Mariah, Meat Loaf, and Celine songs done a year. On the other hand, I have 19 Conway Twitty songs in my book, with no asterisk.

Just like some I refuse to offer for other reasons (Bloodhound Gang, Adam Sandler). I have plenty in there that I do offer. There are some I would like to remove but can't get away with it. The ones I have removed I can get away with.

I like my method. It gives people something to browse in a nice book, but keeps costs and paper usage down.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Kudos to you, Mick, for valor! I would love to take every one of the tracks you mentioned out of my books- ESPECIALLY PBTDL- but at least one of them ( with the thankful exception of The Wreck) gets requested every show. They'd shoot me.

I have been blessed by the fact that no one has EVER requested The Wreck. Hell, it puts me to sleep when I sing it in the shower.....

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

what are you doing sleeping in the shower?? Sounds like a rather life shortening experience!

So what if they do? Who do you think is coming to your show? Singers! Let them sing what they want!

Glad you like it. It just amazes me to see someone treat their customers like that. I have tons of songs I personally don't like, but again, it's not about me!

Knightshow - I lived in Overland Park for a few years. What part of KC you live/work in? I'm down in Springfield, just a few hours south of ya.

I'm not a smoker but I do have the frequent the restroom and those songs can give me some minutes for relief. And as many times as this one group tells me to sing Pearl Jam's Black, I feel that as a slow song, and I'm the one singing it. And the Evenesence over and over again that one girl always does because she has the voice.

Independence, MO... just moved back here a few years ago from livin in the Pacific NorthWest for 11 years!

Still only doing a solo gig here and there. The competition in this town is really hit and miss. A couple of good companies, but mostly a lot of hacks. It's rare when I go out karaoking anymore.

I got family in the Ozarks, and my ex-wife's family is all over Springfield! !

The only two places (before I ever started singing) I remember up in KC were some place I think called the Peanut (?) near 75th & Metcalf and some place in Olathe somewhere on near I-35 and Santa Fe st?

Recently I read about a study on the ability to carry a tune. The results were that a majority of people were able to carry a tune. Of those that couldn't there was a segment that had the ear to know they weren't getting it right but just didn't have the ability to produce the sound they were aiming for. The other segment had such a bad ear they didn't know they weren't getting it at all and thought they were doing a great job.

It seems there is at least one of the last at every show. Unlike the person who knows they are struggling but just wants to do their favorite song, these people think they are the star of the show and pick long ballads like "Love Theme From the Titanic." They are oblivious to the numbers of people who suddenly decide to take up smoking. I always wondered about the courage of these people to keep going in the face of such little audience encouragement. Now I think they are just mercifully clueless.

My voice teacher has been in the business for 27 years. She says there have only ever been two students -- of several hundreds -- that she thinks had no chance. Quite a few were a long struggle to make progress, but eventually they got it.

I think some of it is genetic. There is one family at my service club who is, shall we say, extremely pitch-challenged. When I found out one fellow was the son of a pair of parents I knew well as poor singers, my first thought was "well, they bred true". But the mother has been practicing a lot and she has markedly improved in four years. She is still bad, but she isn't totally awful.

They all exhibit the other problem singers have, tempo and timing challenges. They just can't seem to get the timing right. The one son is truly awesome. He is as bad as I have ever heard after years of singing.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

I'm in category 2 but have improved with practice. I always had the timing/tempo which at least eliminates that irritation. But because I practice so much to get the tune, I always end up pretty much already knowing the words and never paid attention to the sweeps on the screen. I'm always listening intently for my "marker instruments" (no not guide flute, just a chord or some note that helps guide the key) rather than concentrating on the lyrics. (which is why I usually need to sing to my own discs--my marker instruments need to be there or I lose the key.)

But I notice some of our singers who have tempo problems are trying to let the sweeps guide them as to when to sing and not all sweeps are created equal. If they were able to sing by letting the music guide them instead of the screen, they might have better luck with timing. On the other hand, I've seen people who are truly gifted musically do a song cold just by letting the sweeps and chords guide them and they come pretty close to the actual tune. When I saw someone do that on a kamikazi they had never heard before, I was sort of embarrased that I had been doing karaoke for years and it hadn't really sunk in that there even were sweeps to follow.