Fan Fare
Entertainment behind the scenes
from Raw Japan:
Boyle-san’s got tarento
Struggling musicians have long made dubious claims about being "big in Japan" in a bid to compensate for weak record sales at home.
But Susan Boyle, the 48-year-old who swept to fame in Britain and the U.S. after an appearance on reality TV, looks to be genuinely on the cusp of becoming a household name in the suburbs of Nagoya, Osaka and Tokyo.
The Scot’s ascent to stardom in the land of cutesy J-pop and traditional enka was given a big boost when she played a key part in the country’s New Year’s Eve celebrations.
Boyle appeared to wow the audience with her trademark rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream" from "Les Miserables" on NHK's "Kouhaku Uta Gassen", a men versus women singing competition that the state broadcaster has shown on the night of Dec. 31 for 60 years.
Although Boyle looked uncomfortable and awkward amid the sea of sequined waistcoats, sculpted hair and saccharine kids that seem to be some of the main ingredients of this musical battle of the sexes, her lack of glitz and polish will probably be a big plus for her.
Indeed, as I watched the show on TV with my in-laws, a Japanese family from Tokyo, my wife’s dad said approvingly that Boyle is “not flashy” and that this is very much in her favour.
Any viewers unfamiliar with Boyle’s story were filled in by a quick montage before she took to the stage, complete with black and white photos of her childhood, clips from "Britain’s Got Talent" and images of Simon Cowell, one of the judges on that show, in a particularly pantomime villainesque pose.
Susan Boyle takes over reins of “Wild Horses”
Maybe “Salt of the Earth” would have been a more appropriate choice for a Rolling Stones song, but everyone’s favorite underdog Susan Boyle seems to have wowed the masses with her tasteful cover of the rock band’s “Wild Horses.”
The powerful ballad about love and loss is the first single from the British talent-show heroine’s upcoming debut album, and she previewed it for U.S. viewers during Wednesday’s episode of “America’s Got Talent.”
The “live” performance was actually taped the night before, according to the Los Angeles Times, which hailed it as “lovely, inspirational, free of surprises.” Then again, the paper said Boyle’s version lacked the original‘s irony, although it’s not clear that there was any irony in the original.
The single version, with Boyle accompanied by a pianist, is perhaps more faithful to the restrained, elegiac tone of the original version. On TV, she unleashed her inner opera diva and also omitted the third verse, which contains the song’s most memorable line, “Let’s do some living after we die.”
If anyone stood to be offended it was picky fans of the Rolling Stones, but a survey of responses on the fan Web site It’s Only Rock’n Roll indicated near-unanimous approval. There was no immediate word from writers Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. Jagger has said that Richards came up with the melody and the phrase “Wild Horses” and that he wrote the rest. The tune is a popular inclusion in the band’s set lists.
Boyle, meanwhile, is scheduled to release her album “I Dreamed a Dream” on Nov. 24 in the United States through Columbia Records. The shy, 48-year-old spinster rose to overnight worldwide fame in April, after tens of millions of people watched her bravura appearance on “Britain’s Got Talent.” Unable to deal with the sudden attention, Boyle was admitted to a London rehab clinic the next month to deal with anxiety.
I adore this talented singer, she brought me to tears so easily with her beautiful voice. She is a star, I am a singer too, and I called to get back to my voice lessons after I heard Susan sing this song that she turned into a masterpiece. I am hoping to sing this song at my voice lessons, I wish to sound just like her. Thank you Susan for sharing your voice with the whole world. I too have lost my mother, so this song reaches right to my heart.
from UK News:
Is Susan Boyle a dead cert for Saturday?
She's odds-on favourite to win Saturday's final of "Britain's Got Talent," she's become an overnight international star and now she's started out on the trail to tabloid sainthood by acquiring her own headline moniker "SuBo."
But not everyone thinks Susan Boyle is a dead cert for the title. Singer Lily Allen for one thinks she's over-rated. "I thought her timing was off, no control, and I don't think she has an amazing voice," Allen said of Boyle's rendition on Sunday of Andrew Lloyd Webber's "Memory" from the Cats musical.
Maybe there's a touch of over-exposure creeping in. Could the fable of the unlikely lass dragged away from West Lothian and thrust via the Internet into the world spotlight be starting to wear a little thin?
The competition is hot too. Dance acts Diversity and Flawless, singers Shaun Smith and Shaheen Jafargholi and even the Greek father and son combo Stavros Flatley have proved mighty popular with the phone-in viewers who have the ultimate say.
Do you think Boyle is going to win?
Susan Boyle breaks past 100 million online views
Scotland’s Susan Boyle left many viewers in Britain spellbound by her singing on a television talent show, but industry watchers say it’s the Internet that has turned her into an international phenomenon. She has ”clicked” with the online public at a record-setting pace, tracking firm Visible Measures said on Monday.
The latest numbers put Boyle at 103 million total video views on more than 20 different Web sites, said Matt Fiorentino, a spokesman for Visible Measures.
It was only on April 11 that Boyle gained public attention with her performance on TV show “Britain’s Got Talent,” and Fiorentino said that Boyle has become the fastest growing Internet sensation his firm has ever seen.
Compare her numbers to another viral video sensation, the December incident of an Iraqi journalist throwing a shoe at former U.S. President George W. Bush, which had 21.4 million online video views in a week, Fiorentino said.
Clips of Boyle’s performance on “Britain’s Got Talent” have generated 91.6 million views to date, Visible Measures said. The rest of the online views have been for other material, such as Boyle’s 1999 rendition of “Cry Me a River,” interviews and fan videos.
By comparison, comedian Tina Fey’s impersonation of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on NBC sketch comedy show “Saturday Night Live” has generated 34.2 million views.
Boyle has yet to reach the Internet success of singer Mariah Carey’s “Touch My Body,” a video that has been seen 164 million times since it was posted online a little more than a year ago, according to Visible Measures.
After these months, I think the hype has died down. It is sad to see that most people are not really interested in her singing but for the buzz of it all.
