Karaoke Forums

I know we've discussed this quite a bit. Different view points.

When I have a gig, and for someone I haven't worked for before, I always let them set the rules for questionable language whether it's karaoke or DJ. I always try to buy both versions of a DJ song (edited/unedited).

Having said that, I still use discretion depending on the song. I personally have seen some hosts with as big a potty mouth as some of the patrons/singers. I grew up with the type of peers that I cussed like a sailor as good as anyone else but always knowing when to keep it under wraps. I taught my son that value from an early age.

I know some in the forum have strict rules for bad words and some may be in the middle, some may have some rough gigs where everything goes. I'm just interested in hearing some specific stories, not everyone's philosophy on the subject.

_________________
KingBing Entertainment C'mon Up! I have a song for you!!! [font=MS Sans Serif][/font]

but Rip, it's all just philosophy....if your in a place where everyone is over 21, drinking alcohol, and hoping to eventually get laid.....you shouldn't be offened by a few four letter words....even if you're the hippocrit that owns the place...... ....no alcohol or children present, then no foul language.....but then you can't let the kids sing most of their generation's songs.....

Our story is basically we used to let everything go (early 90's). Got a large, drunken and rowdy college crowd - however not huge spenders, would usually come in big groups & buy a pitcher of beer between them (one person buy, then the next after the first empty & so on). So no ONE person was spending more than a pitcher. These people would purposely pick any song that had f-bombs to any other type of song with swearing (edited or not) and muddle through the song and scream - not just say the words. These same people would usually start SOME kind of altercation throughout the nights as well. It was mostly screamers, not so much good singers. About 94 the owner and manager got tired of this crowd & the songs in question and asked that these songs no longer be sung, I argued we would lose the crowds, but ultimately went along with it. Well after a couple months, we did lose most of the rowdy crowd, what I didn't expect was a substantial gain in better 'singers' that spent much more $$. Turns out people (even though it's a bar) do not care to hear people screaming f-bombs over the mic all night - so I quit arguing after that. I have since taken out any song that may be questionable. That doesn't mean they don't ever get done, but I have to know the person and that they can censor themself.

_________________
LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

JR you are a hoot! There's places for that I'm sure but there are others that like to go out and won't go there because they are not like you.

Hence, Lonnie's place.


But I'm looking for specific stories of things that happened perhaps triggered by a request for one of these songs or because one was sung, or not allowed to be sung. Something like that.

_________________
KingBing Entertainment C'mon Up! I have a song for you!!! [font=MS Sans Serif][/font]

We had the opposite happen. Someone wanted to sing the "Barstool Song" by Rehab and, being from a Honky Tonk, we had the cleaned up version with Hank Jr. The two guys stopped mid-song, screamed into the mic, "Your songs suck!" and walked out. A few weeks later, someone else requested the same song and we warned them that we had the clean version and they said that was fine. Then they proceeded to sing it as the profanity version, yelled at the end, "This is how we do it in OUR town," and walked out.

That's the great thing about the mute button "YOUR SONG" would have been about all they got out.

Now don't get me wrong I am all for singing the songs as written in venue appropriate settings. But if I am allowing a song to be done that is questionable in a venue or setting that doesn't want them done, I tell the singer to edit themselves (and I keep my finger on the mute button the entire songs as well).

a long time ago... before I started my own shows...

I was starting the song "Picture" (I know, I know)...

I look out over the crowd in the Bar/Pizzeria and I see about a half-dozen kids from 5 or 6 to early teens...

Here comes the line... "I've been fuelin' up on _______ & _______"

I blurted out "Ice Cream & Jelly Beans" and just about every adult in the place grinned or laughed. It was a spontaneously funny moment.

That being said... the KJ who hosted the show at the time used to sing the same song with me on occasion and we had worked out a much raunchier version with added lyrics and we'd go for shock value when singing it.

"I can't look at you while I'm lyin' on top of her...."

"I can't look at you while I'm goin' down on him..."

Stuff like that as well as responses to the verses and a little dance move during the chorus. Not really any "Dreaded Dirty Words" but definitely adult themed concepts.

To my knowledge, no one was offended.

The only song I've ever received "offended" comments/feedback from is "The Lap Dance Is Always Better When The Stripper's Cryin'" by The Bloodhound Gang. One person was a young woman who left the venue. She didn't tell me, but a mutual friend informed me that she left because of the song. There was one other person who commented on that song saying: "Do you have to let them sing this? The girls really don't like that song and you're messing it up for the guys because the girls are upset." This came from a 23 year old guy who was apparently trying to protect the virtue of the very females that had requested that their friend(s) sing the song for them. I just smiled at him and told him that he could tell any girl he wanted that I was the devil and the reason that he can't get any action is because I let people sing dirty, nasty songs that only dirty, nasty people enjoy. He was discouraged when he realized that he would have to wait for the offended girls to stop listening to their friends sing before he could let them know that they didn't like that song.

_________________
Never the same show twice!

That's funny, I used Pepsi and Ice Cream at a school function once.

_________________
KingBing Entertainment C'mon Up! I have a song for you!!! [font=MS Sans Serif][/font]

We actually haven't had any rules specified anywhere except for the Boys and Girls Club that didn't want even "Highway to Hell." So we made a set of "Clean" books and the parents would ask if their kid could sing a song not in them......

I make it a point to tell people that request "no dirty songs" that I will do my best, but I don't know the words to every song I own and can't be the "Karaoke Police".

I mean c'mon. If you don't want your kids to sing dirty songs, tell your kids not to sing dirty songs! Don't expect total strangers to suddenly parent for you.

When I went out to Karaoke this past Sunday night, one of the songs I sang was "Barnacle Bill the Sailor" (thank you Thunder for referring me to the "Drunk and Disorderly" band for a copy of that disc). I like to do this song once in a while. This is a song that I have sung at a few venues.... specifically places where I knew the crowd there could handle the language content.... PLUS, the Woman who sings it with me has to be a real good sport.

I sang it this past week because this one (sweet innocent looking) woman asked if I wanted to sing it with her (we have sung this a few times together). The reaction is hysterical, because nobody expects this one person to get up and stand for that type of song, let alone stay there and sing it to the end. While we were singing the song, a few Women (who never heard this before) were watching with jaws wide open, and tears of laughter coming down their faces. They were lapping it so much, they were even running up to the screen to see what the next BB come-back lines were going to be before I sang them).

Needless to say, everyone at this place loved the song. Noone took offense to it. Noone left.

Several years ago, I went to some local place that I had never been to before. When I got there, I discovered that the KJ was someone who I had known years before. During the show, these two elderly women (must have been in their 80's), approached me, and asked me to sing "The Pussycat Song" They told me that they remembered me singing it at some bowling alley Bar, and loved it. I was totally surprised by that, because seeing some elderly people at a Karaoke show would normally make me not even think about a performing a song like that.

This song has been one of my Signature songs over the years (ever since SC 8532 came out). I get requests for this song almost every time I go out (to places where the people know me).


Now, on the other side of the coin, I once sang this song at Ellis Island (Casino Bar in Las Vegas) about 5 years ago. I had handed up my personal disc with the song selection. The KJ called me to the stage, and I sang it. After I finished, the place was roaring with laughter, and the Waitresses came over to me and thanked me for breaking up the monotony there (with something so different). They said that they loved it. Several of the other customers appraoached me to ask where I got that song from, and I told them. When I was ready to hand up my next song to the KJ (this one was a clean song), he said, "I hope it isn't anything like your last song! I don't want you singing stuff like that at my show!" Apparantly, he was the only one who didn't like it.

Probably just didn't like the fact that the crowd dug it.

Some people are prudes, and some just have no sense of humor. Of course, I do use some judgement before singing songs like that at Karaoke. I will scope out/get a feel for the crowd, and I definitely would not sing it in a Family type environment (where they could be kids present). Now kids were not allowed in this particular place, so that wasn't an issue.


Third story with this song.... Also in Las Vegas.

One night I was at The Golden Nugget for Karaoke. I was with a friend, and I had submitted "The Pussycat Song." As I was waiting for my turn to sing, I was beginning to notice that there seemed to be a lot of Female couples there. I started to have second thoughts about singing this song to (what had turned out to be) a large Lesbian crowd. After debating about it, I decided that if they couldn't take a joke, then it was their problem. A little while later, I was called up, and I started to sing it. While I was singing the song, some of them were even singing along. When I got to the line that said "FREE... P****Y", one of them shouted out, "Uh Uh... Not mine!" The whole audience started cracking up.

Someone will always be offended by almost everything.

There was a girl who came up to me in tears a few weeks ago while I was singing the first song of the night. She said that her mother had just died the day beforer and she needed some peace and quiet, and couldn't STAND karaoke and actually asked me to basically turn everything off and not work. Mind you, this is interupting in front of about 45-50 people WHILE I'm singing. I pretty much ignored her, but made it a point to talk to her after my song and try to explain logically that I could not just NOT do karaoke, as this was my job, and I told her that maybe the bar was not the best place for her to grieve.

So she calmed down, stopped crying, and stayed at the bar.

The next singer comes up, and sings Mary Jane's Last Dance by Tom Petty.

The girl erupts into tears, and comes running up to the stage screaming and cursing at the singer something along the lines of "My dead mom's name was Mary, you a$$hole!" then trying to wrestle the mic away.

The bouncer then kicked her out.

Extreme example, but an interesting night none the less!

_________________
C Mc
KJ, FL

It's just the same as tv standards, you can't show a ladies chest, but you can see it being shot and stabbed. I remember a venue where they had no profanity, but yet Dixie Chicks Goodbye Earl and Marty Robbins El Paso was being sung, so I thought of a good song that had some dirty thoughts. I sung Collective Soul's December and I grabbed the mic stand putting it near a lady's head while singing "just turn your head now baby just spit me out" which no one never realized that the song was about that until they read the lyrics and I did that notion.

Cue, I know you and I have no doubts as to your honesty, intergrity, humor and above all "your ability to entertain". I also know that you are considerate of others (way beyond what you should be). If you lived in my area have no doubt that I would want you at one of my shows every night of the week, because I know that you would be a hit with the crowds regardless of age or any other sudo criteria that so many KJs seem to put on the patrons they want at their shows.

When I was working bars I was known for putting on a raunchy show. If I was wearing panties for armbands by the end of the night I counted it a good show. But.... One night a group of young gentlemen put up a song I didn't know I had called "The Ballad of Chasey Lane" somehow I made the connection between name and occupation as asked one of the young gentlemen "Chasey Lane the porn star?" They all nodded in agreement. The song began. I let it play all the way through. I am told I was quite pale. You know I just can't seem to find that song in my list anymore.

_________________
Okay, who took my pants?

Actually had Chasey Lane sung tonight, it was a hit with the late crowd.

I have a pretty mixed crowd at one of my venues - early in the evening the older crowd is there finishing up dinner, waiting to sing...and as the night progresses the chairs get taken over by the young crowd. Ironically, it is the older gentlemen who just LOVE to hear me sing the (@$%&#!) song...Just cracks me up... Youngsters love it too - especially if they have new friends sitting with them who have never heard the song before. It's a gem.

Chasey Lane: Late night song. F##K You: Late night song.

This is so crowd/venue dependent. I would never allow either of these to be sung at the local Eagles club...but definitely ANY time at my Wed venue, and when the youth have taken over my Thur venue.