Thursday, July 3, 2008

CD Review: “Country Sings Disney”


With all of the success of the “Disneymania” CDs and the fact that Disney owns Lyric Street Records, it was only a matter of time before Disney opened up some of its music catalog to country artists.

But let’s face it. The real gems on “Country Sings Disney” are the songs that were already country: Billy Ray Cyrus with Miley Cyrus on “Ready, Set, Don’t Go,” the outstanding Rascal Flatts cover of “Life Is a Highway” from “Cars” and Billy Ray Cyrus’ tremendous improvement of the Sheryl Crow song “Real Gone,” also from “Cars.”

But since this is the “Idol” blog, you guys just want to know how the Lyric Street Idol Triple Threat did with their songs, right?

If you’ve forgotten, Bucky Covington does “You’ll Be In My Heart” from “Tarzan,” Phil Stacey does “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” from “The Lion King” and Josh Gracin recorded “When I See an Elephant Fly” from “Dumbo.”

I’m not sure which is harder. Singing an Academy Award-winning song that was a huge hit for the original artist (Bucky and Phil) or singing a song that didn’t originally have a real tune (Josh). But the triple threat handles both of the challenges admirably…

The thing that most struck me about Bucky’s version of “Heart” is how much he sounds like Phil Collins—no joke (Where was that pretty whispery voice on “Idol”?). Bucky basically plays it safe, allowing most of the country changes to come through in the music. It’s still pretty, but I would’ve liked to have heard Bucky take some small risks with it…

Phil fares much better with “Love,” which is custom made for that gorgeous soaring voice of his. He wisely plays it safe on the first verse, but the second is all his. However, the arrangement gets in his way a bit as the ending stretches out just a little too long…

I’ve actually never seen “Dumbo,” so I had to do a little research on YouTube to find out what the song originally sounded like. And if you’ve seen it, you know that “Fly” is sung by the black crows, but it’s actually more spoken than sung. However, a country version is a simple transition and Josh handles it as best as you can handle a novelty song about a flying elephant. And I have to admit that it comes off way less cheesy than the Plain White T’s version on the last “Disneymania” CD or the Lila McCann/Jim Brickman version on YouTube (YIKES!)…

If you’re a fan of the Lyric Street Idol Triple Threat, I highly recommend you download their three tracks so maybe they’ll get to do this again.

But if you’re a fan of the Triple Threat AND good country music, I suggest you pick up the entire CD for the Rascal Flatts and Billy Ray Cyrus tracks alone.

Plus, Faith Hill does a good job with “Part of Your World.” It just doesn’t work as well without the visuals to go with it…

“Country Sings Disney” hits stores Tuesday, July 8th…
Photo courtesy of Lyric Street Records