Stefanie Heinzmann – The Unforgiven
Best thing about the video for this: what song do the band think they’re playing?…
[Video][Website][Lars Ulrich Totally Being OK With It]
[5.67]
Doug Robertson: The Metallica song that Metallica can get away with playing whenever they’re not playing to an audience made up entirely of Metallica fans, done in a way that would result in the people involved getting eaten alive should they ever attempt to play it to an audience made up entirely of Metallica fans. Not without its charms, but the lasting impression is of a Mel C b-side from around the time she was trying to convince the world that there was more to her than just Sporty Spice. This probably deserves a similar level of success.
[6]
Iain Mew: I don’t know the original song, and if I hadn’t been told it was a cover it could totally pass as a goth-Winehouse original, by a singer with just about the requisite abilities to pull that off. It’s not like “Back to Black” didn’t lean that way already. The bells of doom after the chorus are a particular highlight on a song that smartly navigates its way just the right side of too ridiculous.
[8]
Martin Kavka: Metallica’s not my cup of tea (does anyone in Metallica drink tea?), but I respect them a great deal. I don’t respect this pop cover of “The Unforgiven” at all, even if it has sort of snappy drumming. Why? Because pop songs with melancholy lyrics, when successful, get across the sense that pop is one of the great escapes from pain. This is just some Swiss girl smiling about how mum and dad fuck you up.
[2]
Dave Moore: Hm, never thought about what it would sound like if Natasha Bedingfield to cover a song I used to videotape myself lip-syncing to whilst wielding a toy laser gun. I’m kind of glad it exists, even if it’s beyond pointless.
[4]
M. H. Lo: This teaches us that while it’s possible to cover Metallica with a straight face, not that much is gained by the exercise. Though the sped-up tempo means that we can breeze past the most risible moment – i.e., the Soylent Green-esque revelation, “That old man here is ME (DO YOU SEE???)” — without dissolving into complete hysterics, it’s still hard to listen to Stefanie “dub thee the unforgiven”. In all, passable, but surely “The Unforgiven” is best re-imagined as a balls-out disco anthem? No? Anyone? Jake Shears?
[6]
Additional Scores
Martin Skidmore: [8]
I wish I’d been able to get a blurb in for this one – I don’t like Metallica at all, and this might have been my first 0 of the new Jukebox.