Would he do them any other way?
Posted on 11/23/2006 2:55:47 AM PST by mcg2000
He croons songs including "Frosty the Snowman" on the festive CD 'Happy Holidays.'
Billy Idol has stunned his diehard fans by ditching his punk image to record an album of classic Christmas songs.
The rocker croons a selection of songs including "Frosty the Snowman," "Winter Wonderland" and "Santa Claus is Coming to Town" on the festive CD 'Happy Holidays.'
And the British rocker insists he had no trouble hitting the right notes, because the songs just flowed out of him.
He says, "These songs were a challenge to sing as so many other singers have interpreted them in their own style.
"It was fun to come up against all that and find that these songs sing themselves."
Idol was excellent as the lead singer for Generation X, their first album was great and virtually every song on it was top-20 hit material (in the UK anyway).
I just played a few tracks and was reminded how much they sounded like the Buzzcocks.
It's not a good thing when you begin to hear your voice at the grocery and on elevators. Merry Christmas, Billy!
Would he do them any other way?
It's a laugh, but all of Billy Idol's stuff is pretty darn good (at least through the 'Charmed Life' LP). His original punk band Generation X was the goods too.
All his hits were cut-above rockers: Dancing With Myself, White Wedding, Eyes Without A Face, Rebel Yell, Flesh For Fantasy, Catch My Fall, Cradle Of Love... and lesser-known songs like Shooting Stars and It's So Cruel are flat-out great too. Steve Stevens was an excellent guitarist.
Idol's catalogue is worthy of a re-appraisal nowadays. Hell, in today's lousy music scene, it sounds like Mozart.
He is just not Bing. I remember when Bing sang with David Bowie on Christmas. It was strange.
Still is; Stevens tours with him to this day. Great guitar player.
I think he grew up.
(Well, OK, I hope he grew up.)
I think Billy has great talent, and would like to see him around for the long haul....
I still prefer Billy Idol to Michael Bolton, who is unable to sing a song without giving himself a hernia.
Well, for about 25 years of his life he was not there for himself. That can be damaging to his insides forever.
I'm not a Fundamentalist by any means but I hate how Christmas Day has morphed into this vapid, noisy and very annoying month-long Winter festival. It is all one big commercial that never ends. Always at this time of year I want to go hide in a cave for a month!
Yes, that's what he's singing up in post 23. To be fair, he doesn't snarl much at all - I just framegrabbed one of the few times he did.
Here's the complete song list:
So, you get at least two religious themed songs in there.
I'm just glad someone's continuing the Christmas tradition, and not singing songs of kwaanza or ramadama-ding-dong!
lol that's good
Billy Idol rocks! I've always liked his music.
"With a rebel yell
he cried "HO HO HO"!
His song "Daytime Drama" is good too. It didn't get much radio play.
LOL
"Idol's catalogue is worthy of a re-appraisal nowadays. Hell, in today's lousy music scene, it sounds like Mozart."
While I wouldn't go quite that far - some of today's music, as ever, is very good - I do think there's a lot of music from the 80s that hasn't gotten the respect that it deserves. There was a lot of interesting and innovative music done in the 80s, innovations that mostly aren't seen in today's music.
LOL, that's pretty good.
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