Karaoke Forums

I was going to do this regularly early last year with actual bands and ended up not having time after doing just one.  Fun idea but it was a lot of logistics.  But with karaoke it's easy!  Basically, every 2 months, I'm going to have an ABC's of Karaoke night.  First one was, of course, sponsored by the letter A so if your name started with an A, your first drink was just a buck.  I put out a printout of the alphabet and had people handing me songs and crossing off letters until we did A thru Z.  Very fun.  I did ABC, then it was Blondie, Elvis Costello, Charlie Daniels Band, ELO, Freddy Fender, Grandmaster Flash, Whitney Houston, Iron Maiden, Michael Jackson, the Kingsmen, Liam Lynch, Muse, Naughty By Nature, Oasis, Pixies, Queen, Bonnie Raitt, the Smiths, James Taylor, U2, Van Halen, Whitesnake, XTC, Young MC and ZZ Top.  Phew!  After that, we did an A contest.  We had a folks sing Paula Abdul, the Angels, Adam Ant, etc and the winner got 2 free drinks and a choice of the next disc I buy.  In a couple of months, we'll do "Let It B".  Can't wait!  Anyone else done this?

I really need s'more XTC, even though I OWNED Senses Working Overtime....

Here's an idea.  How about a karaoke night where people can come in, look through your book, pick a song out of it, give you the slip, wait a bit, then sing the song?  

A radical thought, I know.  But believe it or not, some people just might maybe possibly prefer that over having to pay 10 bucks to sing a certain song or having to sing something based on some random letter of the alphabet.  Not to mention have to listen to you spend god knows how much time on the mic each night explaining all of the detailed rules for whatever gimmick you're trying to get going that night.

Keep it simple, stupid.

Huh, a novel thought by RE.....and also in agreement with SW in the same post!

RE - I totally agree....K.I.S.S.


MrD

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All I can say is IF IT WORKS FOR YOU  go for it!
Sometimes differant is GOOD .....sometimes NOT

Really depends on the crowd.

Personally I have a few holes in my singing range and would not like to come up singing the "X" or "V" songs. Sure many bands exist with those names but just none that I like to sing.



An important part of singing karaoke is to find the song that is right for you. By limiting a singer's choice many times they are going to sing a song that is not as "good". Both the singer and the audience may go away less happy from the song.

Now this is different from a well advertized Bowie or other artist Karaoke contest. Then the singers are already pre-warned what they are likely to sing and may be attracted by the idea. Same with emphasising or barring a certain genere of music (no country, punk night etc)

It is fun to occasionaly do a "suicide" karaoke when one does not know what song that they are going to sing but 75% of the time the singer falls flat on their face singing the song poorly. I fear the ABC may have the same problem.

The karaoke singer that has a list of 200+ songs that they feel good about singing is rare, most singers are more in the 10-15 songs or less being in their comfort zone. Forcing the singers to sing songs out of their comfrot zone may drive them away.

hey, who knows? There was a guy in Oregon that had a "karaoke scouts" thing going on, where people got "merit" badges for singing types of songs, so many songs, duets, Acappella, without lyrics, etc. etc. etc...

PERSONALLY, I thought it was really silly, and I'm a former Boy Scout! BUT when I went to his shows, there were people walking around with a sash on and some had accumulated a few badges... I really ate some serious crow over that. What I thought of as really kinda dorky ended up being JUST what set up his show over others, and people got INTO it!

Gee, I never thought of it that way.  You're right.  I'll tell all of the people that have come to our night and loved it that they shouldn't be enjoying our silly reindeer games.  Karaoke should be done a specific way.  I'm very sorry.  Forgive me, I'm new.

Diff'rent strokes, I guess!  The fun of having a crowd of people who don't like a typical karaoke night is that we can do fun stuff like this.  The A-Z thing didn't really take much explaining at all, surprisingly.  There were a couple of times where I said, "Hey, we still need an L!" and someone would run up with a song request.  People got into it.  

Most people stay away from the "paid" songs but folks have still sung over $100 worth of them and loved doing it (so did we and the charity that gets half).  One group of girls got up twice to sing $10 songs a couple of weeks ago.  I know it's hard for you to believe, but there's a bunch of folks who are digging it.  Shock.  The gimmicks are usually pretty simple and other than the alphabet thing, almost the entire night is exactly what you described: people pick a song, wait a bit and sing it.  

It's only karaoke, man.

There was no pressure for anyone to sing anything, actually.  I printed out the alphabet and when someone gave me a song they wanted to do, they'd cross off the letter.  So, people would walk up to where the songbooks are and see what we still needed.  I sang a couple of times when we didn't have a volunteer, which wasn't surprising on a slow night (we had 4 times as many people last time).  The hardest part was actually my limited songbook.  There were lots of choices for almost every letter but there was no getting around XTC and Queen (fine by me) and it was either gonna be U2, UB40 or Uriah Heep.  Like I said, once people saw what we were doing, they seemed to like seeing what songs people picked for each letter.  Fun was had.

TCFK- I say keep doing it if it works for you and ignore the naysayers; they can't see beyond their front door...

I like the ABC idea. I will have to think about it and detail it more out and then I might try it one night. Thanks =)

My regulars know me for doing something crazy, not normal every once in a while in connection with Karaoke and they love it. Most complement me on doing something different/fun every once in a while.