{"id":41358,"date":"2009-02-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-02-15T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/fame\/"},"modified":"2009-02-15T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2009-02-15T00:00:00","slug":"fame","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/fame\/","title":{"rendered":"Fame"},"content":{"rendered":"

If there ever was an album to show the growing pains of the \u201880s trying to find its own sound, it\u2019s this one — the soundtrack to Fame<\/i>. One of the film\u2019s lead actresses, Irene Cara, pulls a Donna Summer and stars on the soundtrack as well. The first three songs are all by Cara, with varying results. The title track is the one that everyone can sing by heart, but that doesn\u2019t prevent it from falling as flat as a pancake. It\u2019s far too dated and the production is shockingly murky. Things improve slightly with the piano vocal showcase ballad \u201cOut Here On My Own.\u201d My pick, however, as the best track on the album is \u201cHot Lunch Jam.\u201d Even with its goofy lyrics, it has a revved-up piano hook that is relentless throughout the song. No wonder its scene in the movie is the most memorable.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The slow song \u201cDogs In The Yard\u201d is performed by cast member Paul McCrane and is a nice, poignant moment that shouldn\u2019t go unnoticed. It is followed up by the dance track \u201cRed Light\u201d by Linda Clifford, which stands out like a sore thumb. Its production is far too polished to fit with the rag-tag feel of the other tracks. Paul McCrane returns with the mediocre acoustic ballad \u201cIs It Okay If I Call You Mine\u201d and while it may not stand out for me, it will likely be pleasing to fans of \u201870s-style folk rock.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The final songs on this soundtrack bring back the nightmares of my own school chorale involvement in all their garish glory. The faux-gospel of \u201cNever Alone\u201d had me laughing unintentionally because it is just so over-the-top. That damn tambourine player needs to be shot. If you think \u201cNever Alone\u201d is bad, wait until you get a load of the closing theme \u201cI Sing The Body Electric.\u201d That song gives me the creeps. Think of it as Hair <\/i>for the \u201880s. Now do you understand? Eew\u2026<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Oh, I know I should go easy on those earnest students of the High School Of The Performing Arts — but since when is high school supposed to be easy? The \u201cwe\u2019re gonna take the world by storm\u201d message that the Fame <\/i>project is trying to convey is a complete sham! The real world just isn\u2019t going to be as accommodating as these students are taught to believe. It wasn\u2019t in 1980 and it certainly isn\u2019t today. To me all of this adds up to a futile exercise in instilling false hope into na\u00efve, spotty teenagers who were born on the wrong side of the tracks.<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Of course, I don\u2019t have children of my own, but if I did, I would be very careful not to sell them a bill of goods by telling them that all of their dreams will come true. Encouragement to find their passion is one thing, but preparing them for the big bad world of brutal competition is another. Sorry, I\u2019ve become too much of a hard-nosed realist to buy what the creators of Fame <\/i>were peddling, then and now.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":29751,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6722],"rating":[5616],"class_list":["post-41358","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-original-soundtrack","rating-rating-d"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29751"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41358"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=41358"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=41358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}