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Scarlett Johansson's Music Video, Scanner Nicole Responds

Posted by Nicole Pasulka

 

We second Scanner Bryan that the music in ScoJo's cover of the Tom Waitts song "Falling Down" is pretty banging. But it seems that our agreement stops there..

Scanner Nicole's sweeping review is, of course, a click away.

Scarlett Johansson is an average looking woman with an average amount of talent who somehow manages to be photographed and filmed in flattering circumstances by talented people who are very taken with her. And we, for the most part,  are not buying what she happens to be selling. 

We see something of the same thing in this song. It's better than, for example, a Lindsay Lohan track, but not nearly as entertaining because the song really wants to be taken SERIOUSLY as ART. She's singing a Tom Waits song with David Bowie backing vocals and production by TV On the Radio's Dave Sitek, if I'm gonna say it's good, it better be actually good, not just pretty good for Scarlett Johansson. Plus we're currently cringing over the handheld camera, libreal use of dissolves, and close ups of a reluctant starlet having her tattoo covered with makeup before she goes on set.

Pretty good, for a video of a singer who is not terrible.


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Comments

Bryan Christian said:

Ha! I think I'd only disagree with the "average looking" comment at the front -- Really? ScarJo is at the middle of the Bell Curve on looks? Man, I been riding the wrong subways.

April 29, 2008 3:44 PM

Emily Farris said:

I'm very "enh" on her voice. Anyone can sound that good with that much production. It's all production.

April 29, 2008 3:51 PM

rachel said:

amen sister! if your gonna cover a tom waits song you should AT LEAST be able to sound better than him...which really isn't saying all that much.

April 29, 2008 4:53 PM

jwebster8 said:

I agree 100% that her singing is average/below average.  But to say she's an "average looking woman" is utterly ridiculous.   Perhaps she's not to your taste, but "average"?!?  

Go walk around Queens for a while and get renormalized to what average is.

April 29, 2008 5:31 PM

Yikes said:

Am I the only one who thought she sounded as tone-deaf as a little kid singing along to a grown-up song?  Yikes.

April 29, 2008 6:04 PM

moeljartin said:

wow, that really exceeded my expectations in its unpleasantness. Goodness gracious.

April 29, 2008 6:45 PM

vivazoya said:

that is just a GODAWFUL song.  Horrible.  I doubt that anyone could make that sound good, and for the record, I love Tom Waits.  This version - omgnoway.

April 30, 2008 12:41 AM

fridgebuzz said:

Eek...her singing is shit...then again so is her speaking voice.

April 30, 2008 5:14 AM

puchinello said:

No, not shite.  It's perfectly fine, for what it is.  How many of y'all ever stood in front of a bash-em-out band and put a song over, howsoever much?  Methinks you all are poseurs, Scarjo is the real.  A hundred acts a night play in NYC don't sound any worse.  I'd go see it, if it were in my corner pub, and she wore sumpin' above the knee.

April 30, 2008 3:23 PM

Emily Farris said:

I sing in a band puchinello (I admit, it's scary shit), and I say if she were performing that live, I'd be impressed—if it came out sounding like that. It's just really obvious that the production is masking the flatness of her voice.

April 30, 2008 3:42 PM

LydiaSarah said:

I agree with Emily, except that I don't even think the production even succeeds in making it sound good. Yikes! What a shame. I like Scarlett Johansson (and I definitely think she's waaay above average in the looks department) and there's nothing at all inherently ridiculous about not being able to sing. Some people can and some people can't. It only becomes ridiculous when you decide that you are going to sing anyway and then you record a Tom Waits cover album with a bunch of big shots on it to distract people from your lack of talent. Scarlett, please be in a good movie soon so I can take you seriously again.

April 30, 2008 5:32 PM

jane said:

The video is kind of embarrassing. Vocals aren't too interesting. But I still want to hear the rest of the album.

Does anyone know what Tom Waits thinks of all this?

April 30, 2008 6:21 PM

jill said:

reminds me of the talk-singing that Sinead O'Connor would do sometimes in her verses.

April 30, 2008 11:57 PM

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about the blogger

Emily Farris writes about culture and food for numerous publications and websites you've probably never heard of, including her own blog eefers. Her first cookbook will be published in fall 2008. Emily lives in Greenpoint, Brooklyn with her cat, but just one . . . so far.

Brian Fairbanks is a filmmaker living in the wilds of Brooklyn. He previously wrote for the Hartford Courant and Gawker. He won the Williamsburg Spelling Bee once. He loves cats, women with guns, and burning books.

Nicole Pasulka is a Brooklyn writer and editor who's always on the lookout for the dirty. Her other virtual home is at The Morning News, where things are squeaky clean most of the time.

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