Why can't Duncan sing?
Topic: Pop
Whilst paying a visit to one of the many public houses in my home town the other day, I was somewhat dismayed to discover that the landlord had booked some 'entertainment' for the evening, in the guise of a bald man in his forties (I forget his name, but owing to his folliclly challenged nature, I think it only right to compare him to ‘80s celebrity swimmer Duncan Goodhew, and so merely for the purposes of this article, we’ll refer to him as Duncan), singing into a microphone attached to a karaoke machine for the entire evening. My first reaction, as I entered the pub to the murderous cries of the Rolling Stones, 'Alright Now', was that it certainly wasn't 'Alright Now', and was compelled to do an about turn of 180 degrees, and exit from the direction I had just come.
But, I decided to persevere, reasoning to myself that in an attempt to add some colour to the weekend’s drinking rituals, the landlord had hired out Duncan’s karaoke machine, as opposed to Duncan himself, and so surely anything that was to follow couldn’t possibly be quite as torturous. Not that I thought that the obligatory ‘howling’ renditions of 'I Will Survive' or 'My Way' performed by the regular pub goers would be particularly pleasant, but surely they couldn’t be as bad as Duncan.
Unfortunately, as the events of the evening entailed, I would never actually find out.
And so, as Duncan slipped into his fifth rendition in a row, the pain continued, as I sat shivering outside in the beer garden, in a vain attempt to get as far out of ear shot as possible. If this had taken place a few weeks earlier, this wouldn't have been quite so bad, basking as we were in temperatures hitting the mid-30s. Unfortunately, the British quota for tropical temperatures had already exceeded its four week limit, and now we had returned to the dull drizzly weather the British have come known for. And so it was a close call between hypothermia and permanent hearing loss, but something had to give.
Meanwhile, Duncan's still going, and by this point of the evening he's moved onto a rendition of 'Wig Wam Bam'. Chances are this was the version released by Glam Rockers The Sweet during the mid 1970s, somewhat taking the Red Indian references to extremes, with it opening with the following lines
Hiawatha didn't bother too much
'Bout Minnie Ha-Ha and her tender touch
Till she took him to the silver stream
On the other hand, at times it was so difficult to actually decipher the lyrical content of what Duncan was actually singing, that there was probably an equal chance that he was actually referring to the version of Wig Wam Bam recorded by ‘Riot-Girrrrrrl/ Punk-Pop’ band The Donnas during the late 1990s, which opens with the following lines
I don't want to be a bother too much,
I just wanna be the girl you wanna touch.
You make me cream in my jeans
Had it genuinely been The Donnas version that Duncan was belting out, the general consensus all round would have been that even the merest thought of Duncan ‘creaming his jeans’, would have been enough for the pub’s entire clientele to lose their dinner, lunch and breakfast, not to mention any alcoholic beverages and bar snacks that they‘d have consumed since entering the establishment.
Of course, Duncan’s a pro; he’s done this before. The way he worked the crowd, with many a middle-aged housewife or flat cap wearing pensioner eating out of his hand. His between song banter wass nothing less than 100% pure dynamite, coming out with such lines as
"Are there any Beatle's fans in tonight?"
And
"Are there any Elvis fans in tonight?"
And
"Oh bugger"
As the karaoke machine at one point tried to put itself and ourselves out of our joint collective misery, by blowing a fuse early on in the first set.
The lull was short lived however, and pretty soon, Duncan’s suicidal machine is up and running again, and as the evening wears on, Duncan breaks into a rendition of ‘Angels’, by Robbie Williams. A cringe worthy song at the at the best of times, but somewhat fitting given the circumstances.
Personally, I have never been a fan of Robbie Williams, and find ‘Angels’ the epitome of everything that is wrong with the world, coupled with it bringing back far too many drunken memories of Student Union discos at the end of the night when you’ve failed to pull yet again, and so your stuck in a line with a load of other equally luckless blokes, all belting out versions of ‘Angels’, pretending that they’re actually having a good time.
But then, that’s just me.
As for Duncan, if he was playing at in Blackpool, he’d be so end of the pier, he’d be in the water.
I for one, am the first to admit that I can’t hold a note to save my life, having consistently scored a rating of ‘extremely poor’ on Playstation’s ‘Song Star’ karaoke game, but the difference between myself and Duncan is I wouldn’t inflict my voice on a pub full of half petrified, half deaf punters, for an entire evening.
None the less, I think we can all expect to see Duncan up there with the rest of the no hopers on one of the million or so upcoming editions of this years tiresome run of ITV’s The X-Factor (think American Idol with added Sharon Osbourne). And I for one can’t wait.
Posted by levers
at 6:46 PM BST