I have discussed here before how fast media and technology are all evolving at a rate most people over a certain age have trouble keeping up with. Music artists today use new technologies in their music and new tools to interact with their fans than artists had available to them 25 years ago. ”We Are The World 25” is a perfect compare and contrast to the original “We Are The World“. As someone who was around for the original, I felt this version was very well put together.
Let me do a little comparing and contrasting:
I was a young lad in Jr High when the first “We Are The World” came out and it was big! I had to take the bus to the mall, run to Sam Goody located in the basement and buy it with cash from my birthday money. No gift cards yet. I purchased the state of the art cassette. It was small, portable and went right into my trusty Sony Sports Walkman, all state of the art at the time. Nothing but the best. I then went home and made copies for everybody, LEGALLY! ;) This would take me most of the day.
Fast forward 25 years later. To purchase “We Are The World” this time around I opened up iTunes on my iPhone, went to the top sellers list, touched “buy” next to the “We Are The World” song, typed in my password and the song is on my phone about 30 seconds later. Progress is good! :)
It’s a great song for a great cause and I was familiar with every artist, old and new, but I have heard many of my colleagues say the song should not have been redone. It’s a classic. Why are these artists there? Who are these singers? Why did that kid get to sing the opener?
“Thanks to those who made me feel old“. I couldn’t possibly type out the answers to all these questions but I did find the choice of the opening solo and the closing solo’s interesting.
Let me start by saying I have discussed this kid, Justin Bieber, in the past. He did the opening solo. He is huge and if your not on twitter you might not ever know how big he really is. He could very well be bigger than Micheal Jackson as he will be able to reach more people via today’s technology. He’s the first true musical talent found on YouTube and who actively uses twitter. And, yes, I do believe he has actual talent that will continue to grow. This is a great choice for an opening solo as it grabs the attention of probably every tween and teen in the world and that was the goal of this song, to reach a new generation.
As for the closing solo, T-Pain, Mr Auto-Tune, who is the very last artist to perform before LL Cool J breaks out the rap portion, is a very interesting, controversial choice which kinda makes some sense. Does he have any actual talent? We may never know but he does sound good auto-tuned. This is “his” unique brand. I have discussed auto-tune in the past in case your not sure what it is. As the first artist to auto-tune everything he has produced he is the original auto-tuned artist and all others will be followers. T-Pain even has an iPhone app which I have bought and had tremendous fun with. Alas, Even auto-tune can’t help my voice. ;) Maybe one day T-Pain will be considered the “Godfather of Auto-Tuned” or some other original title. For this reason alone he will be cemented in music history. He took a risk and the risk paid off despite all the criticism to the contrary.
So technology has really had an impact on the music industry. 25 years ago Justin Bieber and T-Pain probably never would have been able to launch careers. New technologies open up new opportunities.
One more compare and contrast: I also remember crowding around the TV, waiting for MTV to air the original video. Now I’m really laughing (LOL’ing) because we would never had thought about recording the video to watch over and over on our VCR’s but now you can watch the video anytime you want on YouTube. You can watch it anytime on your smartphone, or if your like me, your iPhone. You can even watch it here ;)
I could go on and on about all the differences between the two versions but I do like to keep my postings short. I highly recommend the new version and felt it was a credit to the original version I grew up with. Go out and buy it and remember, it’s all for a good cause.
