He said
Not much has been made of the performances during the Grey Cup halftime show.
The show featured newly-minted Canadian icons such as Justin Bieber and Carly Rae Jepsen appearing to pretend to sing along to hits teenyboppers around the world have fallen in love with.
To be fair to Mr. Bieber and Ms. Rae Jepsen, musicians have a long and storied history of lip-syncing at half-time shows. They are just the most recent culprits.
I skipped the half-time show on Grey Cup Sunday, so I checked the video out later and it appears the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Medal recipient from Stratford is guilty.
However, as much as I like to deride Bieber, this isn't a time that calls for it. Lip-syncing is generally to be expected at a sporting event like the 100th Grey Cup. While I have little respect for musicians who can't perform live, the quick, hit-and-run platform of halftime shows leaves little option.
There isn't much time to set up, so things are slapped together pretty quick. There isn't much time to make sure the vocals are at the perfect level.
The other thing about bringing in a Bieber or a Jepsen is that they are performers as much and perhaps more than they are vocalists. People don't want to see them standing behind a mic, belting out a ballad. People want to see the Biebs dancing and moving around. Some people want to see that.
If these singers are putting on a show, it's difficult to do the moving and grooving and provide a great vocal performance.
The halftime show is a promotion of the particular musician and the goal is to appeal to everybody, trying to get as many new people to tune into his music as possible. The CD already sounds exactly the way they want, so it's the safest promotional tool available.
She said
As much as I love Justin Bieber, there's no excuse for lip-syncing an event, especially when the artist can sing. JB, I went to your concert in Saskatoon, which was obviously live, so I know you're talented! You could have - and should have - performed live at the Grey Cup. Or maybe you shouldn't have performed period, though that's a whole different can of worms.
Singers have a career because of their singing abilities. They sell albums, in which songs they recorded are contained. I admit that most artists digitally alter their music in the studio, to produce unique and exciting sounds. That's fine with me. When I buy a CD, I'm expecting to listen to something that has some degree of manufacturing.
But a live performance should be live. Consider: Josh Ramsay sounds a heck of a lot better on a CD than he does live. Don't get me wrong, he's a great performer and I really think he's a talented singer, but in front of a loud crowd when he's a bit out of breath, he's nothing special. But at least when he claims to perform live, he seems to be really singing.
I can't think of another profession that is cool with faking a job well done. Remember that reporter a few years back who pretended to cover a war overseas and actually just wrote articles from his apartment in the U.S.A.? He's the journalistic equivalent of lip-syncing. Sure, he's probably talented, but he chose to take the easier way out (for whatever reason) and didn't perform like he should have.
There's no excuse for lip-syncing. Artists should be mocked for it whenever they get caught.
