The ORIGINAL We are The World: Can't Be Topped!
The music we loved in our late-teens to late-20's is the music we'll always love the most, through our lives, because it was our exciting companion as adult life was opening itself up to us. Easy or hard, painful or a triumph, now finally life was OURS to make OURS, and the music that swirled around us was laid down in our brain's neural pathways and the depths of our hearts, and will never leave us.
The shocking death of Michael Jackson finally galvanized me into buying "things-Michael" - beyond the requisite Thriller - something I kept meaning to do but kept putting off. So once in buying-mode (how do I turn this mode off?!), I had this album on my list. I finally succeeded in getting an original one at reasonable cost, breathing a sigh of relief since these are not that plentiful and I'm sure people are hanging onto them.
The title track is the one and only reason I bought. I hail from those times: born in '57, so I was in my wonderful, difficult, mind-boggling mid-20's when Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie wrote this song and called together the astounding cadre of superstars to harmonize this immortal song to aid the suffering peoples of Africa. The event, song, and entire concept caused a sensation at the time, and added dimension to the popular view of Michael Jackson as musical superstar: he was now understood to be a humanitarian mover-and-shaker.
"We Are The World", the song, will carry the listener to emotional places not often visited, by power alone of the voices heard in its masterful blends and sequences. The poetry of its words further affects, and last, the mission of aid for a remote continent seemingly to be ever in harm's way. The melody and rhythm of the song are caressing and repetitive without in the least losing one's interest, since variations in instrumentation and the symphonic array of voices are part of its fabric. I can never listen to this song without crying in a way that feels cleansing and fortifying. Word to the wise: I also purchased the video, but haven't yet felt gutsy enough to watch what will certainly be wrenching, seeing Michael in his prime throughout.
The CD includes nine other songs, by artists Steve Perry, The Pointer Sisters, Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, Northern Lights, Prince & The Revolution, Chicago, Tina Turner, Kenny Rogers, and Huey Lewis & The News. Big-to-huge names all, but to me not only anticlimactic but unnecessary. How to measure up to the giant mythic title track? Anything will seem shabby by comparison - won't it? I often don't even want to listen to them; I often don't. But I feel compelled to confess (hearing myself make that uncultivated, ignorant, probably infuriating remark), that I am in no way a rock music maven, and no one who is should put much (or any) stock in this particular commentary. Those with knowledge of the artists contributing songs I am sure will find pleasure in their songs. Sigh . . . next time I will listen to those nine songs FIRST, open-minded, and only then the title track; such will be my stab at equal-opportunity.
FINAL RECOMMENDATION: BUY. In any form, one MUST have the title track: as a piece of music, for its beauty and wonder; for its historic significance; and for the REALLY young, who'll have already downloaded the new "We Are The World" for Haiti - which I want as a physical product, not a download (ptuiy!) - just so they can compare. And then argue with their parents on the relative merits.Read full review
