Do You Hate Duets?

I like this one, particularly when he says 'Make way for a lady'.

 

Leave Gweneth Paltrow alone!

 

Louvin Brothers were just great.

Roll on the years and this doing duets with folk from the grave is a no no.

Example ...

Exclusive First Listen: Barbra Streisand and Elvis Presley Sing ‘Love Me Tender’

http://parade.condenast.com/332964/...eisand-and-elvis-presley-sing-love-me-tender/

 

Petty/ Nicks - Stop Draggin' My Heart Around is one of my favorites from either of them.

 

Another pair that recorded some good duets: Little Eva and Big Dee Irwin. I especially like this one:

 

I almost never like them, except for that Led Zeppelin one with Sandy Denny that kind of kicks Led Zeppelin's game up a couple of notches

 

Love duets...double the fun.
of course! JOHN LENNON & PAUL McCARTNEY!

 

my fav is We're Gonna Hold On...Tammy & George.

 

I really liked the Plant + Krauss album, the tour was just as good

 

That's what makes "Jackson" so great, getting to hear both sides. The Fred side and the Wilma putting him in his place side.

 

The Elvis & Frank Sinatra duet in 1960 was a novelty, at best.

 

Well, hate is too strong of a word for me, but I have very little praise for them, if we are talking about Duets style albums.

Duets albums (usually done in the twilight of an artist's career, but increasingly with younger artists too) are almost always formulaic and timid pop music, often with literally phoned-in vocals, which usually takes no chances, raises no bars, and often features an uneven array of partners, from credible ones to really annoying ones. There may exist a Duets album that isn't pure schmaltz, but I have yet to hear or even see it (a cursory look at track listings and partners is usually warning enough for me).

In the case of older artists, it is like listening to a ghost prematurely; the (almost exclusively) younger vocalist's presence serves to remind the listener how faded their star has become.

This is not to say that there is no such thing as a good duet; the Everly Brothers and Simon & Garfunkel made their names on them. But therein lies the difference; their albums broke formulas or created new ones, which should always be the purpose of a duet. Adding a voice should have a function; it should have a musical reason to be there beyond simply adding to someone's resume.

There have been great guest-star duets over the years too. But the best are the ones who don't simply rely on contrived harmonizing, or you-sing-one-verse-and-I'll-sing-the-next coloring by numbers. So if we consider "Duet Album" as a genre of sorts (and I vote that we do), then that is one genre I spend little time dabbling in.

 

If it feels good, duet.

 

As with most threads like this, there's good and bad...can't state definitively one way or the other.

If I were to try and generalize, I might sat that the ones that come because the artists want to do it and find it fun and rewarding are a helluva lot better than those that the record company's contrive in order to try some sort of cross-over to sell more product. Artists that fall for the latter lose some respect in my book.

Nick Cave's duets with Kylie and PJ are great examples of what works.

 

I don't care as long as the song is good, e.g. First Day Back at School by Paul and Paula.

 

http://forums.stevehoffman.tv/threa...-character-in-place-of-the-apostrophe.336541/

 

That`s very interesting, isn`t it?

 

There are duets that I dislike and duets that I like very much, so I didn't vote.

That said, Jimmy Webb's 2010 album of duets, Just Across The River was, I thought, a career low and he's followed it up with another one since. There may be more truly awful entries in the duet genre than any other.

 

If the singers works together duets can be great if they don't it can be awful.

These duet partners made some magic:
Lee Hazlewood/Nancy Sinatra
Dolly Parton/Porter Wagoner
Gram Parsons/Emmylou Harris

 

I voted "Don't Care'. Songs like Walk With You by me old mate Ringo would be nowhere near as effective without the harmonic duo.

 

Freddie Mercury-Montserrat Caballé is the best duet ever in pop-rock-classical music. In jazz there have been many quite good. The list is endless.

 

This has nothing to do with Duo bands, I don"t consider Simon&Garfunkel songs as duets,
but anyway the poll show a lot of haters.., I"m not alone

 

It's fine having a guest to add some spice to the song. But I sort of hate duets that are too self-aware. Like "OMG! Famous singer 1 is making a duet with famous singer 2". Most of the times there's no chemistry and result is... meh, but there's always exceptions to the rule (ie. Gimme Shelter, Ain't No Mountain High Enough).

I do loathe those male-female duets performing sappy love songs, singing face-to-face giving each other that silly/flirty "look". You get the idea. It's feels so cheesy to me.
I can't stand those... "I Just Can't Stop Loving You", "Endless Love", "Nobody Wants to Be Lonely" and the like.

 

First I had to think of.

 

What a weird thing to say.