So when I'm in your neighborhood you better duck,
cause Ice Cube is crazy as fuck.

Guy pointed me to perhaps the strangest cover I've ever heard. Nina Gordon is a female singer with one of those pretty, golden sounding voices. She's done a cover of NWA's Straight Outta Compton with a nice sublime pace and an accoustic guitar accompaniment. My favorite thing about this recording is the complete disconnect between the feel of the music and vocals and the meaning of the lyrics. It's fabulous, and an excellent reminder of why music is so powerful for us. Music holds its emotion, which is seperate from the meaning of what is being said. I'm reminded of The Shawshank Redemption when Red says:

I have no idea to this day what those two Italian ladies were singing about. Truth is, I don't want to know. Some things are best left unsaid. I'd like to think they were singing about something so beautiful, it can't be expressed in words, and makes your heart ache because of it. I tell you, those voices soared higher and farther than anybody in a gray place dares to dream. It was like some beautiful bird flapped into our drab little cage and made those walls dissolve away, and for the briefest of moments, every last man in Shawshank felt free.

I'm not an opera fan, but that's my understanding of what Opera is all about. The lyrics take a backseat to the emotion in the music and vocals. The audience doesn't need to know what's being said - a basic understanding of the plot plus the emotion is what the experience is all about. It doesn't work for me though, I'm too much of a dialog guy.

I'm actually enough of a dialog guy that the reason I like this cover so much is how different the dialog and the music are. I just think that's neat. I think this is also why I'm a huge Barenaked Ladies fan. Many of their songs also have the same thing going on, they sound upbeat and friendly - but are actually very dark.

Anyway, if you'd like to listen to it you can find the track at:
www.ninagordon.com/audio/straightouttacompton.mp3

Great find Guy! It's been in heavy rotation on my playlists all week.

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