Karaoke Week

Hello again, kids! Apparently there is such a thing as Karaoke Week.

I think most people have tried it or seen it at least once. My first experiences with it were when I was about 19 or 20, and I went abroad my sophomore year of college.

It was in the north of England, in a town of about 100,000 called Preston. To give you perspective, it was about an hour's drive from Liverpool and about a half an hour's drive from Manchester. London was a good eight or nine hours drive away.

I had an English Boyfriend at the time who lived in a nearby town called Wigan.

Although if you want to get technical, and I'm sure you do, he actually lived in a suburb of Wigan called Hindley. Anyway. His name was John, he had a car, and he was an older guy (as in 30 when I was 20, not ancient) who taught keyboard and piano to schools and also gave private lessons.

One of his favorite pastimes on the weekend was to "go karaoke". He had his favorites that he'd do, mostly Willie Nelson's "Always on My Mind". People went nuts for that stuff. I never really had the courage to get up and sing, but I did once and it was pretty close to disastrous. Probably something to do with drinking.

I also remember a particularly invigorating round of karaoke at a small bar in Arlington, Virginia with two friends of mine, Larry and Bret.

Left to right, that's Bret, Simon, Larry and Jake.

We went and it seemed like everyone in the place only wanted to sing 80's power ballads. Bon Jovi, Journey, things like that. It was pretty fun as I recall, but again, I didn't sing.

In recent years, a friend of mine named Jim loves to go do karaoke. He's quite good, he has a deep voice and sings quite well. I go and egg him on and that's about it. But, the ladies seem to love it.

What about you? Have you done the karaoke scene? If so, what are your favorites? Do you just watch? What do you think about the experience of shared singing?

Sonically yours,
Behka