Defying Gravity Falls Flat

I was excited when I first heard that Glee would be covering "Defying Gravity" on an upcoming episode. Though I don't consider myself a Gleek, I have been watching the show each week, and was eager to hear how they'd approach the song.

My excitement quickly turned to disappoint when I heard the song. They used the pop arrangement that Idina Menzel released as a solo, which just doesn't do the song justice. Defying Gravity is about Elphaba's realization that she's no longer happy with following the status quo. Now that she sees the Wizard for who he really is, she's deciding that she needs to take action, needs to defy gravity, to do the impossible. As Elphaba's emotions build, so does the song, until she finally breaks free in the last verse, ending with a yell of triumph.

Of course, some of the impact is lost when sung out of context, but it shouldn't be gone completely. The pop arrangement used is too passive, never building or going anywhere. The last verse, the most memorable part from the original, was cut, yet they still left the big money note. Either cut the ending completely, or do it as it was written, but don't pick and choose. As it is, the ending of Glee's version is jarring and out of place, and appears to have been left just so Lea could sing it, rather than as a natural progression of the song.

While I disliked the arrangement, I do think that both Lea Michele and Chris Colfer did well with what they were given. And I actually enjoyed the version in the episode more than the iTunes version, if only because seeing the characters as they sang at least added a little more emotion to the song.

It was their originality in songs like "Don't Stop Believing" that really hooked me to Glee in the first place. Hopefully Glee will return to those roots, rather than reusing arrangements that weren't very good to start with.

Coming Around to Next to Normal

First, I'm trying to win tickets to see In the Heights, when it comes to LA next summer. If you could spare a couple seconds and just click this link, I would really appreciate it.

Now, moving on... Over the past few days I’ve been listening to the cast recording of “Next to Normal” on repeat. And for most of that time I was still trying to decide if I actually liked it or not.

I first gave the musical a listen in May, on a long bus ride. Earlier that day I had listened to “The Last 5 Years” for the first time as well, and was hooked from the first song. “Next to Normal,” on the other hand, failed to hold my attention.

So it wasn’t until the past week or so that I really gave it another chance, and it was partially because I was just looking for something new to listen to. One time through, still nothing. Second time, zip. Third… one of the songs actually stuck, “Superboy and the Invisible Girl.” So I listened to that one on repeat for a while (and learned all the lyrics, and scribbled them in the margins of my notebooks) before returning to the rest of the CD.

And now, according to the play count on iTunes, I’m on my 15th listen of the whole thing. In addition to “Superboy,” many of the other songs have also lodged themselves into my head. Once you've listened to something so many times, the melodies start to stick.

But it's not really the music itself that's finally gotten to me, but rather the story and characters behind it. Natalie especially stood out, first in "Superboy," then in "Everything Else," and just her sarcastic comments in general ("It's going well..."). And then after that, it took a few more listens to better understand the parallels between Henry and Natalie, and Dan and Diana. It probably wouldn't taken so long had I been paying full attention to the music, but I simply let it play while I did other things.

I still wouldn't say that I'm in love with the show, but I like it a lot more now than I did after my initial listen, during the summer. And it's gone from a show I'd see just because I've heard it's good, to a show I really would like to see. Hopefully someday I'll get the chance.