William Shatner - Searching For Major Tom

Motley Crue

"The Shat's" new album is hitting shelves later this year on Cleopatra Records and features a who's who of Rock/Metal collaborations in helping Shatner put together this 18 track Space Themed CD which covers a lot of Rock classics in the process!

I cannot wait to hear his take on this stuff!

The tracklisting has been revealed as the following....

Space Trucking (Deep Purple)
She Blinded Me with Science (Thomas Dolby)
In a Little While (U2)
Empty Glass (The Tea Party)
Lost in the Stars (Frank Sinatra)
Twilight Zone (Golden Earring)
Space Cowboy (Steve Miller Band)
Rocket Man (Elton John)
Space Oddity (David Bowie)
Spirit in the Sky (Norman Greenbaum)
Bohemian Rhapsody (Queen)
Silver Machine (Hawkwind)
Major Tom (Peter Schilling)
Learning to Fly (Pink Floyd)
Mr. Spaceman (The Byrds)
Iron Man (Black Sabbath)
Planet Earth (Duran Duran)
Walking on the Moon (The Police)
Mrs. Major Tom (K.I.A.)

JBnaglfar

Should be an interesting release, plenty of big names involved. Has Been was a great album. The originals were great, I wonder how much of that is down to Ben Folds. A little unsure about a cover album tho, his cover of common people was fantastic but his covers on The Transformed Man were a little eh, underwhelming. Looking forward to this, but in a cautiously optimistic kind of way.

Just to add some info: Here's the wiki page which lists artists who will appear on the album. The list includes Richie Blackmore, Michael Schenker, Peter Frampton, Bootsy Collins.

Here's the man himself talking about the album last year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-XVovaw0vAI

Shatner and Zakk Wylde

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=db1RcRqtDqU

slavetothegrind

the mans biography is a good read.
he is a legend.
a disturbed man but a legend.

nyarlothothep

Shatner is too awesome to be mentall disturbed. He transcends everything, he is a walking demigod like his most famous character.

JBnaglfar

Bumping this thread as I found a 20 minute making of/promo documentary of the album. Has a good few previews of the songs too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVI79PmIzFE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TLD6bZIouE

Motley Crue

I love William Shatner, nothing but respect for him, and I can't wait for this album. But he's talking in this video about the artistic struggle of making this song and yet when I listen I just hear Shatner reading the lyrics in spoken word and adopting maybe a sad voice for one lyric and an inquisitive voice for another. I'm not saying he's not talented, the man is a genius, but there is no massive artistic struggle in the sense of recreating Bohemian Rhapsody in this way - he simply read the script and imagined the speaker giving every emotion in their voice, whereas when Freddie sings it he uses the emotion in a different way.

It's artistic license....

He called that guy Adam, is that Adam Hamilton who used to perform with LA Guns

JBnaglfar

Yeah. I completely agree with you there Motley, I think he does overstate the artistic struggle involved in his spoken word somewhat. Presumably it comes from his acting background where spoken word is obviously a fairly major element of the performance. Not sure if it works the same in music, it would be there but probably not to the same extent.

I'm really curious how his voice will sound on this album. His spoken word has worked well with fairly mellow music in the past, but how will it fit with heavier stuff like Zakk Wylde on Iron Man? I wasn't completely convinced by the little bit I heard, but will wait to hear the album. Looking forward to it.

Beekay

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM3J5B2rVBc

Motley Crue

Interesting, not the best thing I've ever heard, but getting there...I'd be more interested to hear other songs on the album anyway

DrumSteve

Beekay wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM3J5B2rVBc

That has confirmed 2 things for me.

1)Zakk needs to find his own voice cos he sounds crazy like Ozzy.
2)I will not be surprised if Zakk one day composes a song that consists entirely of pinch harmonics.

Also Shatner is win, but by god he sounds drunk or summit on that.

omerin

jesus thats terrible, will that man do anything for money? Shame he's ruining his legacy for this muck. Referring to James T btw

Fentdog84

This album is freakin amazing!!

Motley Crue

Fentdog84 wrote: »

This album is freakin amazing!!

It is, yes, it's a great album