The Karaoke Diaries: Chapter 2

I never really got over my fear of public performance. So my stage presence was essentially nil, standing in one place holding the mic stand.

And refusing to make eye contact with any observers.

That also meant… that I didn’t take a whole lot of chances with my song selections. I always envied those who could open the song book, pick a song seemingly at random, and perform it at least halfway decently.

The closest I ever came to “kamikaze karaoke” was when I sang Alien Ant Farm’s cover of Smooth Criminal.

I mean, I suppose I was as on-key as I needed to be, but it takes a certain kind of stage presence to pull that one off (see above: I had nil).

I may have uttered an apology into the mic after that one.

As I mentioned before, I have a very narrow natural vocal range. I do have the ability to go very high, but not much in the somewhat-higher-than-middle range that a lot of songs require. Karaoke machines do have the capability to pitch a song down, which conceivably could have increased my options.

But I also happen to be OCD about the way a song sounds, and always tried to make myself “sound just like the record.” So that was a no go.

That still left a bunch of tunes at my disposal. I (fairly) successfully attempted everything…

🎤 …from Elvis Presley’s Teddy Bear

🎤 … to Cake’s Never There

🎤 … the Partridge Family’s I Think I Love You

🎤 ... to Modern English’s I Melt With You.

I was occasionally fortunate enough to be asked to be the male half on Summer Nights and Love Shack (the latter was especially fun; makes me wish I had tried Rock Lobster at least once).

Need You Tonight from INXS and Santana’s Smooth were mostly in my range, although I did strain to hit the higher notes in the choruses without sounding like Peter Brady making that change.

Then there was Shaggy’s Angel, which started out as one of my favorites (going back and forth between the singing and sorta-rapping was entertaining even to me), but I quickly got sick of it when my friends asked me to do it every…single…week.

I empathize with any actual touring performers who have to do the same set of songs night after night and keep it fresh.

Now what I lacked in melodic range, I made up for with a decent sense of rhythm, which made me gravitate toward rap. Bust A Move, Rump Shaker, and The Humpty Dance were my favorites.

I’d known them since they were first hits, so had the lyrics down pat and got to the point where I barely needed the video monitor to keep up the flow.

(foreshadowing…)

The audience always got a kick out of seeing this skinny, dorky white guy spitting bars. Ironically, my worst karaoke performance was a rap song done by an actual white guy, Ice Ice Baby… In my defense, I’d been pushed beyond my normal two-drink limit and was in no condition to pull off anything aside from maybe Friends In Low Places.

I guess the good news is I don’t even remember it enough to be embarrassed by it, so we’ll just leave it at that.

This being Clearwater Beach, the two busiest times of year for Fanny’s were during Spring Break (tons of college students out to party), and the week leading up to New Year’s Day. The latter was because that was the day of the Outback Bowl over in Tampa, and there were always game-related activities going on at the beach during the days before.

(Side note: apparently for the upcoming season, the bowl sponsorship has gone to Reliaquest, so farewell to the Outback name after 27 years.)

For the 2002 edition, South Carolina was taking on (The) Ohio State University in a rematch from the previous year, and I ended up with a bunch of female Buckeyes on stage with me during my rendition of Nelly’s Ride Wit Me.

Spring Break was even wilder. I don’t recall the exact year. It could’ve been anywhere from ’01 to ’03), but one weekend Fanny’s was packed, probably beyond legal capacity. So I decided to do Back That Azz Up for my first time ever. I promptly ran into a problem when the floor and stage both filled with inebriated college students, partially obstructing my view of the lyrics monitors.

I didn’t have the song completely memorized, and my brain kept trying to switch back and forth between the dirty and clean versions. I’m not even entirely positive which lyrics were coming up anyway. All I could see were wildly flailing heads and azzes.

I stumbled my way through; I’m pretty sure I made up some words that weren’t even part of the song. The beat was all that seemed to matter anyway, so I managed to escape that misfire unscathed.

🎤 (meet-up here next Thursday for the triumphant and final Chapter three…)

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