Remember when people singing bad covers of rock songs was called karaoke and didn’t involve a national television audience? Oh, for those more innocent times. Now we’re subjected to one musical reality TV show after another. The latest combines The Apprentice and Survivor (same producer), with American Idol; bands compete to be the lead singer of INXS — amusing, because I had no idea that band was still together. (I think they should have gone with Menudo, but what do I know?) And the name, which I can’t say without chuckling: Rock Star:INXS.
Two reasons this is CDM-worthy: first, anyone up for a Web-based electronic music reality show? (I think we should lock a bunch of musicians in a house for 2 months with nothing but a single Atari ST, personally.)
Second, behind-the-scenes this show has some serious music geek cred. Steinberg Nuendo powers all the audio mixes, for sending practice MP3s to the participants and the mixes you can buy on the Website. Music director Paul Mirkovich is a big Nuendo fan and veteran of Cher’s last tour; check out his soft synth arsenal: Steinberg The Grand, NI’s Reaktor, B4, Pro53, Giga Studio libraries through ReWire, Atmosphere, and Steinberg’s D’cota. Paul is obviously a fan of the “Go to Sam Ash and buy everything you see” strategy CDM appreciates so dearly. You’re one of us, Mate.
But wait, there’s more — the dude plays live with the Muse Receptor so he can go live with all the plugins.
Suggestion to networks: in future, cover the real musicians. They’re more interesting.