July 22nd – Two seemingly unrelated events
today…seemingly…
The one thing that irritates me…well there’s lots actually, I
mean lots…and lots, but one of the things that irritates me is the shortcuts
people take in order to achieve what they consider to be their right; i.e. a
fast route to fame and fortune.
Plagiarism (or, as some in the film industry call it;
referencing) is the act of using someone else’s work with which to bolster or
improve one’s own artistic shortcomings and, by giving notification of said
referencing it seems that everything is alright, that somehow the original
creator will be flattered…? Whatever, we all know of boy/girl wonder-writers
who, at the tender age of ten or fifteen, have, according to the critics (a
more worthless bunch of free-loading toads I have yet to come across) ‘created a dynamic, exciting and totally
original piece of fiction’ only to have it discovered that it’s far from
any those things and was first published fifty or twenty or ten or five years
ago by an established writer. The referencing excuse is non-usable in these
instances because it’s not just the odd line from some worthy work that’s been borrowed
but whole chapters, whole storylines, whole chunks of dialogue.
On this day in 1987, Morris Albert, who composed the massive
hit, Feelings (I’m amazed it was a
massive hit ‘cos I always thought it was a dirge…a sort of self-flaggeratery
piece of wailing and moaning about one’s lot in life, but, still…) Morris
Albert was found guilty of plagiarising the 1956 French song, Pour Toi in order to create his own masterpiece.
Donovan; anybody? Good, bad, indifferent?
I think, in his early incarnation, he could have been sued
(and would probably have lost) for plagiarising a Dylan look-sound-sing-alike
with a dash of Woody Guthrie thrown in for good measure. His own writings are
OK. He was the first to cotton on to wallow in the flower-power rut and foist
it as his own, so it can be said he had an eye for the next big thing, and his track
record is impressive, but it always seems to be included along with his musical
life. Where I do get derailed with him, and this seems to be the crux of my…not
dislike, that’s too strong a word and a waste of good emotions…mistrust, that’s
the word, the crux of my mistrust with him is I still haven’t got over his
cover of Buffy-Saint Marie’s original, Universal
Soldier; such a sanitised version of what is, next to Mr. Dylan’s Masters of War, an
all-singing-all-dancing, bitter, incredulous, damning indictment of the folly
of combat.
It feels, as you listen to Donovan’s version, that the MOD
paid for the recording so as to rubbish the sentiments in it; much like BAT
advertise cigarettes and the fictional lifestyle that goes with it (instead of
showing iron lungs, people dying of lung diseases, people of all ages gasping
and grabbing at their last, choking breath before slumping to the floor, blue
in the face and panic in the eyes). If you can bear it, have a listen to
Donovan’s version of Universal Soldier
but only after you’ve gone onto
YouTube and listened to the true version. Ms. Saint Marie has an edge in her
voice and a turn of phrasing that can only be injected into the song (her song)
by having really thought about the consequences and reasons. IMHO Donovan uses
the lyrics as a karaoke sing-along.
On this day in 1996 Donovan’s US tour was cancelled because
of a previous drugs bust. It has to be said that he was the first high-profile
pop star to get done for puffing on the devil’s hay, but going on past records
I bet he was sharing a joint someone else rolled…
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