Now, not only is karaoke available in a home version, but late-night talk show hosts burn air time “lip-syncing” “popular” (corporate-backed) songs. The boring blond from\u00a0Amos & Andy For Nerds<\/em>, excuse me, I mean\u00a0The Big Bang Theory<\/em>, lip-synced<\/a> her way through a Ludacris song where almost every other word is “bitch”. The idea being, look at this little white girl act “gangsta”. As long as the star is corporate-backed, this is “empowerment”. What do you imagine happens if someone without<\/em> a hit show* tries this?<\/p>\n *You know, a product of one of the six companies and their offshoots.<\/p>\n Karaoke in bars is terrific because it helps people loosen up and come out of their comfort zone. Singers use the privacy and darkness of the environment to become someone else. Training TV cameras on the act drains it of its charm and reduces it to cheap imitation.<\/p>\n So of course, it’s already been a TV show.<\/p>\n Jesus wept.<\/p><\/div>\n Puttin’ On The Hits<\/em> aired on weekends from 1984 to 1988. From that Wikipedia thing:<\/p>\n The show grew out of lip syncing contests developed by Wm. “Randy” Wood, who by 1982 had realized that his contests had grown so popular nationally that he needed to stage them on a broader scale. The planning process eventually grew into Puttin’ on the Hits<\/i>.<\/p>\n Contestants would often dress up in costumes and use props to make their act more outrageous. This varied from a seemingly severed head singing “I Ain’t Got Nobody” to an Aretha Franklin\u00a0drag act using couch cushions for breasts. Other acts were more conservative and placed emphasis on performance.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n In junior high, my testicles were smashed by a weight machine. It was about a day before I could walk and talk again. Everyone laughed at me, because it was funny as fuck. I would sooner relive that experience in full than sit through five minutes of\u00a0Puttin’ On The Hits.<\/em><\/p>\n If you had a sister or female cousin in 1984, they liked this show. Moms and aunts loved it. The rest of us would run out to the yard and physically abuse each other. A thousand pink-bellies would be preferable to some ding-a-ling from Kew\u00a0Gardens miming his way through Van Halen while jumping on a trampoline.<\/p>\n JESUS WEPT.<\/p><\/div>\n You see,\u00a0Puttin’ On The Hits<\/em> was from the creator of\u00a0The Gong Show<\/em>, and retained that amateur-hour atmosphere. Contestants were more enthralled with the idea of being silly on TV for five minutes than getting\u00a0discovered as the next superstar. If a song’s title\u00a0could be molested as a bad play-on-words for its duration, these sons of bitches would do it. (Actually it was only for about a third of the song.)<\/p>\n![\"puttin1\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.bandsiusetalike.com\/biul\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/puttin1.jpg\")
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