So Scarlett Johansson recently released an album of Tom Waits covers. It wasn't a big deal or anything. It wasn't all hyped-up, she didn't go on a tour or push it on Letterman, and it wasn't going to be a big crossover hit. It was just a little vanity project made by a music fan that happens to also be a gorgeous movie star. And it's not bad, either. It's not fantastic or anything, but it's definitely not awful. It sounds like Nico singing Tom Waits songs, backed by TV on the Radio (who produced and played on the album). But the thing is getting hammered. It hasn't sold well (I don't think anybody expected it to) and it's generally derided by everybody.
The main problem is that the album has no audience. To the Perez Hilton, celebrity-gossip set, the album is too weird. I mean, who's Tom Waits anyways? And where are the club hits and the sexy music videos? They expect Scar Jo, being an actress and all, to make fun, vapid albums like the ones "made" by Paris Hilton and Lindsey Lohan. On the other hand, the cool, "indie" kids who generally wet their pants over Tom Waits and TV on the Radio can't get with it because the millionaire actress from Michael Bay's "The Island" who's engaged to that douce Ryan Reynolds is butchering these Tom Waits classics. I mean, who does she think she is? She can't know anything about alternative music, right. Right?
So she's screwed both ways. To the Hollywood set, the music is too weird. And to the alternative set, she's too mainstream to touch their way of life. Personally, I thought the album was pretty good. And, I mean, this is Scar Jo! She sang with The Jesus and Mary Chain at Coachella a couple years ago and was in "Lost In Translation" and "Ghost World"! She's earned a couple "cool passes" in my book, although that Ryan Reynolds IS a douche.
Here's the video for her first single, "Falling Down".
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment