Your choice for the hardest song to sing at a Karaoke Bar? Mine is "Along Comes Mary."

I'm very good at being spontaneous. Rehearsing does make it easier though.

 

This town ain’t big enough for the both of us - Sparks

 

I like God Save the Queen.

 

& I like the old, unofficial Scottish national anthem (Scotland the Brave) best especially when accompanied by bagpipes. I just love the sound of bagpipes. They're my favourite instrument.

 

Heart: Magic Man

 

Unchained Melody - whether it's The Righteous Brothers, Elvis, or Roy Orbison, those are some hard vocals to match!

 

Any Sparks songs really, unless falsetto is a way of a life for you

 

You beat me to the punch my friend. I have tried that Elvis version a few times, but I have to be fully warmed up and with a great sound system to even want to sing it at Karaoke. I use to be able to sing a pretty decent cover of Roy Orbison's Running Scared, but I'm not sure I have the upper range I use to have to attempt that one again. Elvis's version of Hurt is a real tough one as well. I have only tried that one a few times and usually when I was just amongst friends, Lol.

 

I picked "One" waiting for the 3 Dog Night version to start. I was ready to belt and groove. The karaoke guy pulled up the (in the style of) Harry Nilsson version instead. Couldn't figure out the key for one since I had 3 Dog Night in my head. I gave up halfway through and asked the guy to stop the song.

Doing "Back in the New York Groove" I dropped the mic and walked away during the end/fade out. Singing the title at least 10 times in a row was enough for me even though the song didn't seem close to finishing.

 

Autumn Almanac - brilliant, but it goes all over the place.

 

If you want to simultaneously embarrass yourself while demonstrating what a good a singer John Lennon was, try ‘I Should Have Known Better’.

Sorry, all incriminating evidence has been ruthlessly suppressed.

 

Yes my friend, those are some tough songs to sing, as they all end on high notes that are just beyond the range of most guys... And even if you do hit them, they will rarely sound as big and operatic as they should

 

Just try to get through this one, especially the sped up second half. Jim Dale himself barely makes it through haha

"Museum Song" from the musical "Barnum"

 

The thread title caught me today. What kind of a scapegoat sets himself up to sing a song people know from a group singing in unison. I wouldn't even attempt it; I don't care how "clappable" it is.

I usually make a short-list of esoteric songs I like but I never hear anybody choose for karaoke. I have a high range that lets me choose songs altos might sing, and stay comfortable. I stay away from songs guys might need falsetto for, in case the beer and the smoke in a bar, make that trick suddenly impossible for me; my falsetto isn't all that good even on a strong day. I've had people suggest songs for me to sing that start comfortably, but they know I'm gonna be in trouble midway through and I never take the bait.

But a song a whole crowd can recognize, but the karaoke deejay tells me, "wow, I've never heard anybody ask for that one before", is my win-win.

 

Don't know the song, but a Chinese pop song at a Karaoke in Taiwan. A table of drunk Taiwanese I had befriended made me take the mic. Chinese lyrics, chinese words, I don't speak any Chinese. I just sort of howled along trying to hit the consonants and vowels as they came up, to the melody which was very predictable. They loved it, nobody mocked me, genuine compliments after . . . surreal. But a lot of fun.

 

I've never tried karaoke; I've often thought my go-to song might be Rhythm of the Rain by the Cascades, which is fairly accessible (assuming I could remember all the words -- I've heard it enough in my life that it shouldn't be a problem).

I like to think that on a very good day I might hit the full range of notes in Blue Angel by Roy Orbison, but I'm probably kidding myself.

If the motormouth delivery of Along Comes Mary is a problem, then Life is a Rock by Reunion or Obscurity Knocks by the Trash Can Sinatras isn't going to be your friend either.

If you can't cover the range, you might not want to try Two Faces Have I by Lou Christie or (LOL) Martian Hop by the Ran-Dells ...

 

The patrons at a typical Taiwan KTV admire enthusiasm more than anything else. Give it your all and you are a star, no matter how questionable it sounds. My roommate and I have a combined 50 years of singing professionally on our CVs, but the people who can't sing their way out of a furnace get just as many applause, as long as they perform with gusto.

 

When you have to sing Simon & Garfunkel in order to leave purgatory/afterlife & come back to the living.

 

"Delilah" by Tom Jones.

Tom sung this at the top of his register when he was 27 or 28. Hence he doesn't sing it in the same key anymore.

I was congratulated for singing it an octave lower in a karaoke bar in The Algarve 25 years ago.

I could probably do it in the right octave these days - now that I know the true way to sing it - but it wouldn't sound very pretty.

(One of the keys to singing high notes is not to be afraid to give it some. Another is to learn to use your chest voice so as to protect your larynx from permanent harm.)


"It's Over" by Roy Orbison because of the last 'It's Over'. Absolute classic, and heartbreaking when you learn the story behind it. (Eat your heart out, Adele.)


"I'm Gonna Be Strong" by Gene Pitney because you can tell yourself "I'm doing great" until the final "Cry" (which actually sounds like 'Croy') when Gene goes to a place that we normal humans simply can't go without needing vocal surgery.

(His "Close To Your Heart", which is less well-known, is also a b*gger to attempt.)

 

Also, anything by Sam Smith. Having tried to do what he does, I can understand why he needed surgery on his vocal chords. Some of the sounds he makes require a lot of pain.

 

Not sure why you'd even try that if you don't have a bit of singing background. After a couple years of voice lessons, it's still tough for me to belt that as an alto. And it has to be belted, right?

 

I've yet to do this myself in public, but feel free to sing along to Focus's Hocus Pocus:

BTW, this arrangement above doesn't include the non-yodeling voice/keyboard section .. or whistling section.
Compare:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4ouPGGLI6Q

 

Roy goes falsetto for those final notes, so less of a strain than one might imagine.

 

I came across this when in 1976 or 1977 I came across and snaffled a pile of US Arista promo singles in a box in the back of the record wholesaler where I worked in Harlesden in NW London. Fabulous, unrestrained semi-scat singing.

There was also a copy of "Tico Tico", plus singles by Barry Manilow, Headhunters, Linda Lewis, and Sam and Bill. Most of the singles had the same track on both sides, with one side being in stereo and the other being in mono but always as a (boring) fold-down.

 

Yes. Belted. If you're a bad singer like me, stick with Johnny Cash and "Ring of Fire."