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Fast Car

guitardeac said:
Actually Tracy Chapman didn't perform at Live Aid. She was still in college at the time. You are probably referring to her performance at the Nelson Mandela 70th birthday celebration in which Stevie Wonder had technical issues and Chapman hurried onto the stage under immense pressure to fill Stevie's time even though she had already performed her set. It was at this time that she introduced Fast Car to the world and it is considered one of the best live solo acoustic performances ever.
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Thanks for the #facts
 
SC DEAC said:
I don't really know Luke Combs' music all that well, but I think it is idiotic for a rich white guy to cover a song that is all about the hard choices and compromises that poverty forces women to make. I mean I hope Tracy Chapman makes a pile of money from this, but c'mon dude, show a tiny bit of self awareness.

I read an interview with Combs that said that he used to listen to this song with his daddy in his truck and that it brought back great memories of the truck and I just wanted to scream THE SONG IS NOT ABOUT A CAR(or truck) , you idiot!!!
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Idk man I don’t buy the epistemic privilege angle, you don’t need access to other people’s experiences to honor their art, at least in my humblest opinion.

It just so happens this cover sucks BIG TIME.
 
TownieDeac said:
Idk man I don’t buy the epistemic privilege angle, you don’t need access to other people’s experiences to honor their art, at least in my humblest opinion.

It just so happens this cover sucks BIG TIME.
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Agreed, but it’s debatable whether or not he’s “honoring” or just repackaging someone else’s art for a different audience. Ultimately it was hers to sell, and she got paid a lot, but IMO, “honoring” would have been playing it live and giving her credit as the original artist, or playing it as a duet with her at a country awards ceremony.
 
White guys covering (read: stealing) Black artists work to even greater profits than the original is a cliche at this point, at least this time the Black person gave permission and got paid handsomely for it. Don’t see how there is much discussion beyond that.
 
It’s actually a country radio music tradition of mainstream country musicians covering great songs, to the discovery of the mainstream country music audience - Life Is A Highway, When You Say Nothing At All, Fancy, Landslide, Big Yellow Taxi, way more
 
I mean artists cover songs across genre's all the time. It isn't a country music thing.
 
myDeaconmyhand said:
Agreed, but it’s debatable whether or not he’s “honoring” or just repackaging someone else’s art for a different audience. Ultimately it was hers to sell, and she got paid a lot, but IMO, “honoring” would have been playing it live and giving her credit as the original artist, or playing it as a duet with her at a country awards ceremony.
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if tracy chapman feels honored by it then he is honoring her.
There's plenty of real shit for people to be upset about. no reason for this to be a controversy
 
Agree to disagree. Fast Car is a song despair and regret due to poverty....A rich white guy should be self aware enough to know that he sounds fucking stupid singing about that. I don't know, I just love Tracy Chapman's song so maybe I'm not being fair but it's just an outstanding song and I'm a little salty that a fat redneck is making bank off of it.
 
myDeaconmyhand said:
White guys covering (read: stealing) Black artists work to even greater profits than the original is a cliche at this point, at least this time the Black person gave permission and got paid handsomely for it. Don’t see how there is much discussion beyond that.
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Is it better when Hootie uses Wagon wheel so he can pretend to be country? Isn’t it more about the disingenuousness of the whole facade?
 
thatguy2016 said:
Elvis wanted to cover a version of Jolene (presumably changing a few words around) and his reps reached out to Dolly - told her if he covered it, he wanted half the royalties forever. Dolly said no to the King and the rest is history.
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Elvis wanted to cover I Will Always Love You but the rest of the story is correct
 
SC DEAC said:
Agree to disagree. Fast Car is a song despair and regret due to poverty....A rich white guy should be self aware enough to know that he sounds fucking stupid singing about that. I don't know, I just love Tracy Chapman's song so maybe I'm not being fair but it's just an outstanding song and I'm a little salty that a fat redneck is making bank off of it.
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To be fair, the rich, fat redneck has been covering it live since he was a poor, fatter redneck who didn't sound stupid singing about despair and regret due to poverty at the time. He just now has the industry clout to both ask and pay the rich, black woman who wrote it to allow him to formally put it on a record. Is said rich, black woman self-aware enough to know that she should apparently no longer sing about it either?

That said, I think the original song was mediocre and significantly overplayed at the time, to the point it is one of my most despised songs of all time. This cover is even worse. It has been years since I've seen him do it live, but those versions were significantly better than this version that ended up being released, but I still can't stand the song itself because of how much the original got played to death.
 
I think the cover is fine. Easy listening. If Chapman gave her blessing for the cover then get after it man.

That said, of course the country music artist heard the song and said "man I miss my truck"
 
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