Hung on the radio
Could the un-singer help revive lifeless medium?
By Todd Leopold
CNN
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| | ON CNN TV |  "Eye on Entertainment" talks about the weekend's happenings on CNN's "Live Today" between 10 a.m. and noon ET Thursday. |
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(CNN) -- I'm counting on William Hung to save pop music radio.
For those that don't remember pop music radio -- and let me play curmudgeon here for a minute -- it was this old-fashioned idea that one kind of song could actually co-exist with another. (I know, shocking stuff.)
It had fast-talking disc jockeys with personalities (who actually broadcast from the same town you lived in!), wacky cash jackpots, and you could hear the Standells next to Andy Williams or Gilbert O'Sullivan next to the O'Jays or Edgar Winter next to Donna Summer.
And music radio also had novelty songs. Not just the stuff by "Weird Al" Yankovic -- and nothing against you, Weird Al -- but Mrs. Miller's version of "Downtown" or Napoleon XIV doing "They're Coming to Take Me Away, Ha-Haaa!" (B-side: "!aaah-aH, yawA eM ekaT ot gnimoC er'yehT") or Dickie Goodman's "Mr. Jaws" or even somethin' stupid, if better sung, such as "Telephone Man" by Meri Wilson.
But pop music radio is long since dead, splintered into a million segments -- each with no personality and a DJ 500 miles away and the same R&B ballad/turgid hard rock song/lightweight rap rip-off/overplayed classic over and over again -- and that's why you're probably reading this while listening to your iPod or XM or, if you have a radio on at all, Little Steven's wonderful "Underground Garage."
But William Hung, unique William Hung, could change all that.
Eye on Entertainment raises his voice.
Eye-opener
Hung, of course, is the "American Idol" contestant who couldn't sing. (Yes, that one.) He performed Ricky Martin's "She Bangs" -- dreadfully -- and was voted down by the judges but given new life by the TV audience, who loved him.
He's appeared on several talk shows, performed a handful of concerts, and a month ago, he signed a deal with Koch Records. Now the result is coming out: "Inspiration" (Koch), due Tuesday.
Listen to Hung take on the classics: "Hotel California" and "Rocket Man." Listen to Hung take on the uplifting: "I Believe I Can Fly" and "Can You Feel the Love Tonight." Listen to Hung take on "Y.M.C.A."
And I say, thank goodness. Thank goodness for something different.
I'm not the only one either. As I write this, "Inspiration" is No. 43 on Amazon.com's best-seller list, and that's several days before its release.
OK, "Inspiration" isn't going to make anyone forget "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band." Heck, it isn't going to make anyone forget William Shatner's version of "MacArthur Park." And it's a shame, in a way, that Hung has a contract while dozens of terrific local bands fight to get their voices heard.
But as a strike against the polished, blow-dried, pre-chewed sludge you find on radio today, I'm all for it.
So call your radio station and request Hung. Request him a lot. Request other songs that are different. It might be our last chance.
(OK, it's hopeless. But what better symbol of a hopeless cause than Hung?)
William, don't ever change.
On screen
The Nazis wanted him, but the Allies got him, and now "Hellboy" is a demon fighting crime -- not making it. The movie version of the comic book series, starring Ron Perlman, opens Friday.The character isn't named Buford Pusser (a real person) this time around, but it's still "Walking Tall." This time it's The Rock who's cleaning up the joint. Opens Friday.Disney's "Home on the Range," perhaps the studio's last home-grown, hand-drawn animated effort, features the voices of Judi Dench, Cuba Gooding Jr., Randy Quaid and Sarah Jessica Parker. Opens Friday. "The Prince and Me" stars Julia Stiles as a college student who falls in love with a Danish prince (Luke Mably). Opens Friday.On the tube
The "American Dreams" season finale, with Wyclef Jean as Curtis Mayfield and the characters caught up in aspects of Vietnam, airs at 8 p.m. ET Sunday on NBC.Paging readers
John Feinstein offers the biography of Tom Watson's caddy and good friend, Bruce Edwards, in "Caddy for Life: The Bruce Edwards Story" (Little, Brown). Due Tuesday.The new novel by Anne Rivers Siddons, "Islands" (HarperCollins), comes out Tuesday.
