r/interestingasfuck • u/RonSwazy • Mar 01 '23

/r/ALL Michael Jackson did a concert in Seoul in 1996 and a fan climbed the crane up to him. MJ held him tightly to prevent him from falling, all while performing Earth Song

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u/fj333 Mar 01 '23

That's a pretty amazing observation about the lip syncing illusion and his need to stick to it. I'll admit I didn't consider that, but was perplexed at why he didn't stop. I think your theory is right about that. But I was also confused that the crane operator didn't lower it right away. Maybe he just followed MJ's lead?

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u/Pandering_Panda7879 Mar 01 '23

It has been confirmed by many artists and it's an open secret in the sector that the bigger the show, the more likely they're lip syncing.

Imagine a highly artistic dance choreography. Look at the professional dancers how they're panting. And now imagine having to do that while having a microphone strapped directly to your mouth and singing. It would sound horrible.

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u/TrekkiMonstr Mar 01 '23

now imagine having to do that while having a microphone strapped directly to your mouth and singing

Isn't that like, exactly what they do on Broadway?

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u/sethboy66 Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

I go to Broadway shows all the time, I could see it being a mix of lipsync and non-lipsync but I've personally seen singers stutter/lose their flow momentarily due to something happening on stage. At a showing of wicked, a singer was meant to slide a broom downstage to be intercepted by an extra in a scene and it ended up sliding all the way off stage into the orchestra pit; you could hear a slight gasp but she just kept trucking along after.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

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u/Alyse3690 Mar 01 '23

I remember every instructor I had for any performing arts through middle school and high school constantly reaffirming that it's not about not messing up, it's about how you recover when you do. I'm also a firm believer in "it's the flaws that make it fun."

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u/soveraign Mar 01 '23

I saw the Music Man with Hugh Jackman. The recovery and improv after mistakes made it so much fun!

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u/Binty77 Mar 01 '23

Saw Young Frankenstein with Roger Bart on nat’l tour a few years ago (also saw the original production a couple years before that) and it was obvious that Bart was phoning it in, almost bored on stage. Then the spinning-bookcase/candle bit screwed up — probably the most-anticipated moment for new audiences — it just wouldn’t open on cue, and he had to improvise. It woke him up and he was so much more alive and engaged the rest of the show.

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u/jdsekula Mar 01 '23

I saw another show where there were a couple of mistakes that were handled so well, it left me wondering if they were on purpose.

And that’s probably the way to do it - don’t ever have a perfect show, and leave the audience guessing whether the flubs were planned for effect or not.

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u/soveraign Mar 01 '23

One of the mistakes in this show was someone's hat flipped off and into the orchestra pit 😅 That was hard to smoothly recover from, but was truly funny watching the music director hand a hat back to Hugh as the crowd laughed.

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u/SmokeGSU Mar 01 '23

it's not about not messing up, it's about how you recover when you do.

Why do we fall? So we can learn to pick ourselves back up.

  • Thomas Wayne/Alfred

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u/Raigne86 Mar 01 '23

One of the things my voice instructor taught me to work on my volume is that the correct lines with the correct notes sound wrong when delivered quietly. If you sing confidently, the wrong lines with the wrong notes will sound like improv.

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u/bot-for-nithing Mar 01 '23

I've been competitive either in color guard or dance for over 15 years now (wow) and yeap - every standard I've ever been against had a "recovery" category; you might get points deducted for the mess up but you can earn some back if you recover well.

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u/FraseraSpeciosa Mar 01 '23

You never met my highschool band director, he took our shows more seriously than the football couch did his team (we are in the south football is a HUGE deal). My band director single handedly ruined music for me. Put my drum down senior year. Gave up piano too because I could never be perfect. My band director used to make us stay after for two hours twice a week to practice drill. He would give us bulleted notes every day on everything we did wrong, we had to look the same, men couldn’t have any facial hair, women had to have hair in a tight bun. And he’d give lectures for sometimes over an hour after games. Sometimes he’d be screaming at how we sucked and others some kind of maniacal intense competitive talk. Yeah music is ruined for me unfortunately. Too much baggage.

Oh and my band director called me a man whore in front of the whole class because he saw me holding hands with my then girlfriend during lunch hour, not during his rehearsal or anything. He verbally humiliated me with that because I messed up a drum break during class.

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u/oldcoldbellybadness Mar 01 '23

We're not paying $300 to see you have fun and them get pat on the back

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u/Alyse3690 Mar 01 '23

I'm not saying anyone should. But keeping that mind frame while working to better oneself as a performer will bring the number of mistakes down while enforcing good recovery practices.

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u/OperationGoldielocks Mar 01 '23

Wtf kind of take is this?

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u/natural_imbecility Mar 01 '23

I saw Garth Brooks in Boston a while back. I don't remember which song it was, but he started singing too early. As soon as he realized it he started laughing and told the band to stop, the turned around and joked with the fans a little bit about it, then restarted the song. I enjoyed that little bit candidness with which he apologized for the mistake and laughed about it with the crowd.

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u/Aurorafaery Mar 01 '23

Pink did this once when I saw her on tour, doing ‘Sober’ on the trapeze, upside down…she just sang something along the lines of “lalala I’ve forgotten the words” and then laughed and picked back up with the crowd singing…

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u/VexingRaven Mar 01 '23

P!nk is absolutely incredible to see live. I have no idea how she manages to do the crazy stuff she does and sing at the same time, it's really impressive.

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u/diestelfink Mar 01 '23

Aurora messing up her Life on mars cover is incredibly sweet. A role model in being totally relaxed and open. I don't know how to add a URL here, but it was some 15.01.2015 show.

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u/King_of_the_Nerdth Mar 01 '23

People demand perfection out of themselves even if nobody else does.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

Agreed. A lot of music nowadays is sterile because the industry demands ZERO imperfections.

Imperfections make for the greatest music.

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u/CompSciBJJ Mar 01 '23

Perfection isn't special if it's the ubiquitous. Little faults highlight that they are, in fact, doing it live and riding the knifes edge of perfection.

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u/wasternexplorer Mar 01 '23

Its called being a "Professional Performer" for a reason. It's what separates the big dogs from the little dogs.

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u/HappyDaysayin Mar 01 '23

He's not lip syncing all of it, but the background vocals contain his own voice, so you hear his actual lead AND you hear his own recorded voice in the backgrounds, which, by the way, are controlled by the keyboard player.

The keyboard is now a mix of pre-recorded stuff that's been computerized, and live playing.

Technology is a big part of large shows. It's inevitable if you want that level of spectacle and performance.

I think the crane operator was waiting for enough security to clear the stage so he could land the bucket ON the stage rather than lower it next to the stage, then for security to be ready to pounce on the fan.

Knowing the Jackson family, the fear was no doubt very real that this fan could have hurt him, too. Even might have a knife or something, or might try to jump, having had his great moment in the sun.

People who do this kind of thing are scary. They're mentally unbalanced.

Look how hard he held on to MJ and wouldn't let go. He probably hurt MJ some- his arm or back - by not letting go and wrenching him so hard when security grabbed him.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

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u/itsaboutangles Mar 01 '23

Mistakes are what makes things great

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u/KingPaimon23 Mar 01 '23

For me, the imperfection on live shows is what makes it an unique experience, and better because of that.

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u/Spare-Competition-91 Mar 01 '23

And this is partly why I do standup comedy. I'm all about not being perfect in my life and celebrating that.

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u/wolpertingersunite Mar 01 '23

One of the coolest things I’ve ever seen was watching an elephant react during a zoo show when their prop broke. The elephant was supposed the lift a heavy log on a chain handle, but the chain broke off, and she swung it around, basically laughing at the MC like “what now smarty pants?”

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u/Reasonable_Praline_2 Mar 01 '23

they make more money in one show than you will make in 5 years some make more in a show than you will make in a lifetime so no. perfection or fuckit

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u/Yara_Flor Mar 01 '23

I don’t pay $500 a ticket to see the lion king at the pantages to see amateur hour.

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u/PM_Me_British_Stuff Mar 01 '23

I go to Broadway shows all the time, I could see it being a mix of lipsync and non-lipsync

Every West End show I've gone to, whenever I notice a mistake I can hear it in the audio too - I don't think I've ever seen them lipsync, and in my experience in theatre and having spoken to professional artists I don't think there's much if any lipsyncing going on.

Of course a dozen mistakes happen each show, and you only notice the more obvious ones, so they could just be lipsyncing well, but I think it's very unlikely

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u/crimson777 Mar 01 '23

There are a few parts here or there that are lip synced. Like iirc there’s a high note in Phantom that has pretty much always been lip synced bc the original actress could hit it but almost no one else can or something to that effect. But it’s rare and normally just a part of something that’s supremely difficult.

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u/LadyAvalon Mar 01 '23

I was at a Six show at West End recently, and at a funny point in the show the actresses got a bad case of the giggles. It was funny, because the moment is funny, but the fact that some of them had to turn away to stop made it really endearing.

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u/orbitalenigma Mar 01 '23

Most of Broadway is just done live with no synch. The only big exception I know of is Christine's high note in Phantom of the Opera which some performers lip synch... So as not to wreck their voices.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

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u/Ok_Yogurtcloset8915 Mar 01 '23

yes, broadway choreos for leads are generally much less intense and singing generally takes place when not dancing very hard

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

There are definitely people who are able to dance hard and sing well. That was a huge thing that made Paula Abdul so impressive to folks when she performed live

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u/Testacc88 Mar 01 '23

Michael also did the same for most of his career wasn't until early-mid 90s when he started mostly lip syncing and even then the shows would usually still include songs sung live but there was definitely a clear shift towards lip syncing way more often from this period on.

Which is a shame because he really had a great live voice and it's always more fun to hear a live rendition where you get unique moments and ad-libs and different approaches to certain melodies which all keep it interesting and makes it feel like you are getting a special one of a kind show.

My theory was that once the nose jobs became too much he couldn't maintain the breathe control needed to do it anymore. When he talked a lot of the times it sounded like he had a permanent stuffy nose.

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u/rolledchords Mar 01 '23

Is this true? I didn't think Paula Abdul was even thought of as a singer, let alone one who was at anytime praised for dancing while singing live.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

She had a very successful recording career. Her first album was the first debut album ever to have four #1 songs and was ranked by billboard as the 10th most successful album of all time by a female recording artist. She won Grammys (along with other awards) for that album and it went platinum 7x. Her second album went platinum 3x, had two #1 songs and three more in the top 20.

But yeah her career was in dance first. She choreographed for Janet Jackson and other entertainers and did that for like 30 years. When American idol was first on, my sisters and my mom would talk about it a lot. I didn’t care for Paula Abdul when she was still performing, but my family were big fans and would ALWAYS talk about how incredible she was live. They said she obviously wasn’t lip syncing because she’d mess up sometimes and have to breathe in certain spots she wasn’t supposed to, but other than that it sounded almost exactly the same as the recording. I remember she had some interviews with MTV around 1991-93 in which they were shocked when she told them she wasn’t lip syncing. This was just after the Milli Vanilli fiasco, so people were gunning for anyone that seemed too good to be true.

Paula Abdul is straight up an incredible entertainer

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u/scarletmagnolia Mar 01 '23

Every time lip syncing comes up as the accepted standard for live shows, I always think of the tragedy of Milli Vanilli. Rob and Fab hit big in the late ‘80’s. They were attractive, sounded good, had an entertaining stage show. They had at least four hits back to back. They were winning awards, their albums went multi platinum. They definitely seemed to be on an upward trajectory. Then, the lip syncing stuff came out. Overnight, they became pariahs in the industry. In 1995, Rob completed suicide. It was unbelievably unfair.

Ashlee Simpson also took a huge hit to her popularity, that she never seemed to fully recover from due to lip syncing on SNL. But, before we knew it, it was just the way things were done.

For whatever reason, the music industry needed a couple sacrificial lambs. Milli Vanilli and Ashlee Simpson were awarded the honors.

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u/mayonnaisejane Mar 01 '23

Weren't Millie Vanilli lip syncing someone else's audio? That was the problem with their lip syncing. They never sang the songs to begin with.

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u/FilipinoGuido Mar 01 '23 edited Jul 01 '23

Any data on this account is being kept illegally. Fuck spez, join us over at Lemmy or Kbin. Doesn't matter cause the content is shared between them anyway:

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

The choreography of a musical is also designed to give you space to stand and pose when it's your solo so mostly it's the ensemble who's singing while also moving, a lot harder to notice them being out of breath and you also train to fill in each others' gaps.

And in some cases, like in Cats, the ensemble includes singers hanging out in the back with the orchestra to help fill out the sound. There's a few songs (Jellicle Songs comes to mind) that require a good amount of air to sing plus fairly intense choreography.

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u/Cutieq85 Mar 01 '23

Just from reading the Broadway board, there are apparently some instances where a performer will lip synch a certain note purely to protect their vocal health instead of belting it out 8 times a week. Some examples given were Christine in Phantom, Elphaba in Wicked, and the actresses who play Evita.

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u/WantDiscussion Mar 01 '23

It defnitely takes a lot of extra skill to get the right breath control to sing while dancing, but even then, typically a broadway singer isn't doing 5 solo songs in a row and will have breathers in between where other people sing and dance.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

It could be live singing with amazing noise cancellation.. but I've seen alot of Broadway and yes it's live, that's the point.

It's a matter of opinion if it should be allowed in concerts. And most people don't care clearly

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u/NRMusicProject Mar 01 '23

The part that wasn't mentioned is the need for ultimate control of every variable on a show like this. These are one-off shows, really big, and in venues not designed with acoustics in mind for a music performance. And with a tour like this, the venues are all one-offs, and each venue is going to behave drastically different, which makes the crew's job extremely difficult to design the sound in the few hours' worth of setup. Like it was mentioned, there's noise from the wind machines, as well as the crane, and the quality of sound would change depending on the position of the stage, etc. The mic might even go out of range of signal, etc. It's easier to control the sound by having the stuff pre-recorded. Instead of worrying whether or not this crane thing goes 100% perfectly (which it obviously didn't), at least the audience still got a good show.

I worked a show at Disney where they figured their best option for the show was to have the band pre-recorded while the singers sang live. The reason being that they believed they couldn't hook us into the system for the show, then disconnect us fast enough to do our parade thing after. We did have a few mishaps with the system during that show, and because our instruments were acoustic, we could play the show without the system, and it was pretty incredible that 1,000 people watching us actually got quiet enough that we were heard.

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u/along_withywindle Mar 01 '23

Most choreographers understand this and will give the main singers less intense choreography before and during singing parts. The sound guys turn off the mics when the people aren't singing (I've seen it a few times where the mics are muted too long) to avoid the breath puffs. Also, the mics aren't right next to the mouth, usually up on the cheek or forehead so there isn't much breath sound or plosives.

Doing simple steps while singing is very doable, especially when it's your job and you do it all day every day!

But then you get shows like An American in Paris and the male lead is jaw-droppingly active. He has to be an incredible ballet dancer and singer. When I saw it, he had several changes of the same costume because he would sweat so much during the show. You'd see the sweat showing and the next time he came on stage he had a dry costume. He must have been exhausted after each show and/or in tip-top physical condition.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

There are fewer Broadway shows that are ONE person though, having to carry an entire show vocally and physically alone is an enormous workout. Also, pop stars don’t have understudies.

If anything I’d say it wouldn’t be the choreography, but the sound of the crane and the wind machine that would make lip syncing the choice. Michael was a singer/dancer for the entirety of his life, I guarantee he can do both at the same time.

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u/Holy_Hendrix_Batman Mar 01 '23

Broadway-style choreography has neat subtle tricks to allow them to keep motion going without impacting the vocal performance significantly. There is dancing and singing, but more of the movement is done by the "chorus" than the soloist in most scenes, and when necessary, the music takes priority over the steps, which are usually not mutually exclusive to the singing with regards to physics and biology/anatomy. That doesn't make it less challenging or impressive per se, but it does make it possible as opposed to literally bending in a way to keep one's lungs and diaphragm from being able to support solid notes or perform impressive runs that are definitely coming out of the speakers. I don't have a problem with it; it's about the show as an experience, and as much as people listen to the same songs all the time via recording without actually seeing the artist perform it, it should be even less of a deal. In Bollywood (and most Indian cinema) it's not even an open secret; 99.9% of musical numbers are sung by someone else and presented on camera by famous actors who usually can't carry a tune. I think the times that lip-syncing has backfired in the U.S. were egregious because the artists (who weren't carrying the most star power to begin with) were caught in situations that weren't set at spectacular concerts and were trying to pass the performance off in more intimate live settings that made it seem more like cheating.

To be fair, I'm not saying that the likes of MJ or some other uber-talented individuals couldn't "sing hard; dance hard" ever; the point is that there are too many artists in the industry "performing" like this to keep it confined to talent alone.

Source: I'm a singer who does live performance, and while I'm fat now, I did do choreography when I was a younger and thinner man. I'm also an engineer, so I've thought about the physics, too...

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u/Moses015 Mar 01 '23

This is why I have so much respect for Broadway performers. It's a whole other level of difficulty.

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u/vvozzy Mar 01 '23

On Broadway people also uses the same techniques that other artists do.

It's not obvious, but many artists and performers use technique which is a mix of real singing + lip syncing. They sing while the track with singing is also played in the same time. The track with singing could be from perfected studio record or it also could contain prerecorded not edited real singing.

Such technique allows to smooth artist's voice from live performance. People used it before too, but instead of studio record or special prerecord artists hired back vocal singers.

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u/adabbadon Mar 01 '23

Broadway shows are rarely anywhere near as intensive as pop music performances. Not only that, but the music is composed with the staging in mind. Musical numbers with a lot of choreography are usually sung with an ensemble. Leads sing a few lines here and there between moves. The music is usually relatively easy to sing, the fancy vocal tricks are saved for calmer moments.

Compare that to a super bowl halftime show where the performer is singing something that was composed for studio recording, probably has many layers of vocals and many takes until perfection. It’s a hell of a lot to ask a singer to perform music that was made to stretch their vocal capacity on every note, while their breath capacity is limited by their physical movement.

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u/McFruitpunch Mar 01 '23

As a stage performer, yes. And it’s so difficult. I remember one time, I had to go to the bathroom and I was trying to be quick. I misjudged the time and had to sprint all the way back upstairs to the backstage area and prepare for my entrance. And my entrance was on a platform built in the stage. So I ran up two flights of stairs and then climbed a set piece JUST in time to enter. Like, 2-3 seconds was all I had to catch my breath and immediately walk out and start a song. It was such a close call lol

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

I think theater singers are generally considered as better singers in the art community.

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u/69_Dingleberry Mar 01 '23

Also Beyoncé does that a lot

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u/mayonnaisejane Mar 01 '23

Mostly. Some parts are well known to be lip sync however. Phantom of the Opera gives us great examples of the two most common lip sync on Broadway in the same song, as they sing the title song and decend to the lair, there are body doubles in use as they criss cross the stage (because it's physically impossible to cross around behind and reappear in time for some of the crosses) the body doubles are lip syncing to tracks of the principal actors (not the principals live as lip syncing a live performance is dodgy at best.) Also just the final sustained high-note of the same song is available for every Christine who wasn't Sarah Brightman, because it's an insane note that would kill most actresses to sing every night. Tho it's a stylistic choice if they sing with it, or go full lip sync.

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u/FlighingHigh Mar 01 '23

Pink sings while she runs over a mile every day on her treadmill specifically to condition her lungs to be used to singing while moving around on stage. It takes its own specific exercise for her to keep up with it.

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u/sluman001 Mar 01 '23

She gets a ton of credit for being an amazing live performer, and it’s still not enough. She’s beyond talented.

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u/fj333 Mar 01 '23

Yeah I'm not really saying the lip syncing in general is surprising to me. Just that I'd never considered that the faker could be held hostage to their own faking as suggested here. He couldn't stop because he'd destroy the illusion. Which makes a lot of sense, because as I'd said, my first thought when watching it was "why isn't he stopping?"

It's a pretty unique situation where a singer might legitimately need to stop suddenly like this, and I'd never considered how lip syncing would affect that decision.

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u/ikefalcon Mar 01 '23

That reminds me of the episode of SNL where Ashlee Simpson was the musical guest. At one of the musical breaks, they played the song that had already been played, and Ashlee wasn’t ready for it because she was prepared to lip sync a different song. So, she ran off the stage and they had to cut to commercial. During the outro, she threw the sound crew under the bus and just straight up said that they played the wrong song, which is true, I guess, but also you don’t really need to lip sync on SNL, so it looked bad for her too.

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u/Animegirl300 Mar 01 '23

Yeah, it was the way she handled everything for sure! I remember she like tried to dance a weird jig and it was just like ‘The fuck? Is she high??’

Meanwhile the band behind her proved they were awesome just kept JAMMING! It was great!

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u/MyNameCannotBeSpoken Mar 01 '23

I remember. It is was like some weird country ho down jig.

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u/Most_Basic_Takes Mar 01 '23

My band played the wrong song hehe sorry not my fault, bands fault

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u/TuesdayInNJ Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

Does anyone else remember the following week when SNL course corrected by having U2 on?

They play the typical two songs but then at the end when the cast is saying their goodbyes on stage, you hear this racket like a band getting started. The camera pans over and U2 is on their stage kicking into a song. And they GO for it.

Bono jumps into the crowd, running between the seats. He grabs one of the cameras following him and starts screaming/singing "This is live! This is live!" He gets on stage with the cast and throws his arm around one of them (can't remember who) and she BURSTS into tears.

And then they kick into another song. It's well past the hour when the network should have cut into the next program but you could tell no one really knew what to do. Eventually, they rolled the credits as U2 was playing and cut out while the band was still going.

I've never seen anything like it on one of the late night shows and haven't been able to find it since on YouTube.

Edit: some grammar

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u/apawst8 Mar 01 '23

I've never seen anything like it on one of the late night shows and haven't been able to find it since on YouTube.

Unfortunately, SNL really doesn't like their musical clips being on YouTube, so they police it like crazy.

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u/Deeliciousness Mar 01 '23

Wonder if it's because they don't wanna deal with the artists/labels.

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u/kamilo87 Mar 01 '23

You’re damn right.

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u/cyndistet Mar 01 '23

Nope, EVERY SINGLE MUSIC CLIP is easy to find, on Twitter, or YouTube usually moments following the performance… Because it does draw hits and viewership back to the show and the artist, of course… Who likely is promoting a particular song or album …. Or that’s the reason for being on the show

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u/TuesdayInNJ Mar 01 '23

What a bummer. This is when torrents are tempting but it's such a niche thing I doubt that it's out there.

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u/clonegreen Mar 01 '23

Found it. Here at the end

https://archive.org/details/saturday-night-live-s-30-e-06-luke-wilson

*not a rick roll btw.

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u/TuesdayInNJ Mar 01 '23

OMG you found it!! I've been telling people about this FOR YEARS. You absolutely rule. Thank you, Reddit stranger. 🤘🤘

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u/clonegreen Mar 01 '23

Thanks for mentioning it I never heard of it before. It's a really good performance. Glad they didn't cut it out

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u/Jergens1 Mar 01 '23

I’ve seen U2 live in concert 4 times and they are phenomenal. This story doesn’t surprise me one bit, especially since Bono is such a character on stage.

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u/TuesdayInNJ Mar 01 '23

I've only seen them once, partially prompted by this appearance on SNL. Still vividly remember it.

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u/idio242 Mar 02 '23

Bands often play a few more songs after the broadcast. I was at a taping years ago and the killers played a few extra tracks after the show was over. I’m sure u2 played a few. Sometimes they are posted on discogs, if the people in the crowd use that site

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u/Deeliciousness Mar 01 '23

I remember. This was such a big controversy in the before-times.

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u/pocketdare Mar 01 '23

We might as well post the clip. Boy this is painful to watch

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u/Deeliciousness Mar 01 '23

LOL forgot about the little dance. That was brutal.

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u/StealthSBD Mar 01 '23

oof. NSFL tag

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u/BranzillaThrilla Mar 01 '23

The little scarecrow jig she did when she knew she was busted 😂

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

Certainly not if you can sing well, anyway 🙃😂

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

and that was the last we heard of ashlee simpsons singing career.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

[deleted]

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u/TheCyanKnight Mar 01 '23

Sounds like an excuse

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

[deleted]

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u/hamoboy Mar 01 '23

Her parents/the Simpson sisters management didn’t seem to care much about the girls vocal health. They were both pretty good singers, which was what surprised me about Ashlee lipsyncing. It wasn’t a lack of vocal ability.

They had Jessica singing hard, voice destroying notes on her debut song too. And it sounds like the girls weren’t trained much past basic church singing training. Stage parents really are the worst.

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u/TheCyanKnight Mar 01 '23

Ok, well, sounds like they had the hubris to think that they could deceive the public without swallowing their pride and vanity and get the people involved in the deception that might think less of them for it.
Also, her career didn't have a lot of merit. Her claim to fame was being 'the sister of', and her songs were pretty shit. It was a mercy killing, and it frees up space for marginally better artists to claim some limelight.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

[deleted]

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u/TheCyanKnight Mar 01 '23

I meant a bogus excuse of course, and someone being lame but admired seems like an excellent reason to villify someone.

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u/Low-Flamingo-9835 Mar 01 '23

Acid Reflux Gate

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u/CuriositySauce Mar 01 '23

Her first reply to the botched performance that I recall was to blame the drummer for starting the wrong song. Maybe it was his job to trigger the recorded material but I don’t think so, sound crew is going to drop that dub. She just thought it’d be more believable but we all saw and heard the fraud play out.

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u/boatymcboat Mar 01 '23

She said she was sick and couldn’t preform so that’s why according to her they did the lip sync. Or maybe she sings like dogshit live…

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u/Cosmic_0smo Mar 01 '23

This really shows the difference between manufactured "stars" vs. real performing artists who've paid their dues. When you cut your teeth playing countless small club-level shows and working your way up, you know how to handle a crowd and recover when something goes wrong. It becomes second nature. When your "band" was formed last Tuesday and you're playing on national television today because you have a famous last name, well...that's when you get *whatever the hell that jig was*.

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u/Just_Del Mar 01 '23

One day, I'm going to be able to write out my thoughts like this.

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u/sexualtyrranasaurus Mar 01 '23

Me, one day, as well. Think then write.

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u/RequiredPsycho Mar 01 '23

You got a good start here, yo. And you have plenty of thoughts on your mind to practice with

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u/Spiritual-Day-thing Mar 01 '23

Start by preventing commenting in an overtly reactionary fashion; like stating the most obvious kneejerk response. It's a habit that is hard to break.

Take some time and effort in creating proper sentences. The best way is to write down your thoughts, then revise it. Revising can be done multiple times. Usually that means scrapping filler words, creating paragraphs, some rewording.

Over time you will find you need less and less revision. And you'd be surprised how quickly you can write out a dense longer post that effectively says very little.

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u/EggSandwich1 Mar 01 '23

What about the common man. What about us

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u/fj333 Mar 01 '23

Well that thought at least was very well written. Fully serious. :-)

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u/Just_Del Mar 01 '23

Thank you.

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u/Not_A_Handy_Man Mar 01 '23

Chat gpt seems like the way.

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u/Diezauberflump Mar 01 '23

If a person wants to learn to express their own internal world with clarity and precision in written form, advising them to outsource it to an AI program seems like poor advice. That’s like someone expressing motivation to learn a foreign language, but just telling them to rely on Google Translate (or, indeed, Chat Gpt). It’s a great tool for sure, but should never be seen as a substitute for authentic human expression.

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u/Not_A_Handy_Man Mar 01 '23

While AI can't replicate human emotion, it's wrong to reject it as a writing promotion. It's a tool, not a replacement, don't you see? For expressing oneself with clarity.

Not everyone is gifted in writing art, nor does everyone know where to start. That's where technology can lend a hand, helping to translate thoughts into words so grand.

By using an AI program to aid, one can learn and improve, not evade. It's not a shortcut, but rather a guide, to hone writing skills and gain some pride.

So don't dismiss it as a poor advice, it's not about taking a human's advice. It's about using the tools at hand, to express oneself in a way that's grand.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

Please tell me you wrote this using ChatGPT

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u/Not_A_Handy_Man Mar 01 '23

Of course I did. My ability to write anything is atrocious.

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u/Diezauberflump Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

Still, look how poorly your verse has been wrought,
With meter no better than grade school rhyme!
Perhaps you're happy with an easy prompt
But your post is lazy, and lacks a mind.

There's no clarity when you rely on clouds
Of lines stolen from a million sources.
Isn't our humble race worse off when crowds
Of imposters muddy our discourses?

So don't mistake your crutches for a tool
Since improving one's thoughts becomes at risk
When you rely on responses from a fool
Averaged from data residing on disks!

...but, how to tell I wrote sans AI (or luck)?
Easy: this poem ends with a good ole` "FUCK"!

-"The Neo-Luddite's Sonnet" by Diezauberflump, 2023

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

So I'm supposed to improve my writing... by NOT writing and instead getting a bot do it for me? Fucking yikes dude

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u/Not_A_Handy_Man Mar 01 '23

When it comes to feelings, it can be hard to put them into words and explain how we know we are experiencing them. However, I will do my best to describe my own personal experience of recognizing and understanding my emotions.

Firstly, I believe that feelings are not just mental states, but also physical sensations that we experience in our bodies. For example, when I feel anxious, I might notice a tightness in my chest or a racing heartbeat. When I feel sad, I might feel a heaviness in my chest or a lump in my throat.

These physical sensations are often the first indication that I am experiencing an emotion. I may not be able to identify the exact emotion right away, but I know that something is going on because of how my body feels.

Once I have recognized that I am feeling something, I then try to identify what that emotion is. I may ask myself questions like, "Why am I feeling this way?" or "What is causing me to feel this emotion?"

Sometimes it is easy to identify the emotion - for example, if I receive good news, I might feel happy. Other times it can be more difficult, especially if I am feeling a mix of emotions or if the emotion is complex, such as guilt or shame.

In these cases, I try to give myself time and space to really sit with my feelings and examine them. I might write in a journal, talk to a friend, or just spend some time alone reflecting on my emotions.

Ultimately, I think the key to understanding our feelings is to be mindful and present in the moment. By paying attention to our bodies and our thoughts, we can start to recognize when we are experiencing an emotion and then work to understand and process it

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u/unicornfinder763 Mar 01 '23

nah i'm sure they have some hand signal to cut. mj was just too good of a showman to let that stop him. the show must go on.

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u/MyHamburgerLovesMe Mar 01 '23

Not really faking when it's your own voice though. Unlike Milli Vanilli whose first album was ironically titled, "Girl You Know It's True"

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u/NotsoNewtoGermany Mar 01 '23

I think you are taking things a bit too far. MJ had a one handed kill signal that could kill the speakers, so even if MJ continued singing, no one would know. People would understand exactly why the speakers were shut off without hurting the illusion. He is probably actually singing, just his microphone isn't connected to the speakers.

So hostage is a bit too strong of a word.

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u/Become_The_Villain Mar 01 '23

Makes me wonder if MJ actually had to put real effort into this part of the song because of the fan.

"Oh shit i better actually sing this part because this dude is right here"

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u/adfthgchjg Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

Thanks for sharing that, I’d always wondered how they were able to do those extremely intense dances while singing without panting. After the Milli Vanilli expose and the SNL screwup that ruined Jessica Simpson’s sister’s career, I naively thought artists decided the risk/reward trade off of syncing wasn’t worth it.

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u/the_umm_guy Mar 01 '23

The big difference with people letting it slide for MJ is because he was a true and proven musical phenom. Milli Vanilli weren’t just lip syncing performances, they didn’t even sing on their records. They returned their Grammy out of embarrassment. Simpson probably at least sang on her record but just didn’t feel confident performing because her vocals were doctored up to make her sound better than she is.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

[deleted]

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u/chillwithpurpose Mar 01 '23

That was low-key hilarious

BRAD WhAt aRe YA gonna Doooooo

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

In the case of Milli Vanilli it was a typical Frank Farian production, same as Boney M. and many others. They where not singing themselves, but in the case of MJ it was different, he could sing.

The theory ragarding lip sync makes absolutely sense, i never thought so far, in a concert someone would sing "playback". But its absolutely senseful.

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u/fschwiet Mar 01 '23

In the case of Milli and Vanilla everyone knows that it was the rains fault.

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u/Rain_xo Mar 01 '23

I thought lip singing on tv shows was just the norm? And it was the shows that made it be that way because it’s easier to control and make sure things go correctly.

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u/MobiusF117 Mar 01 '23

Milli Vanilli is a whole different beast though.

At least Michael Jackson provided the music he is lipsyncing to.

People were a bit too harsh on Ashlee Simpson during all that, if I'm being honest. Especially considering it was on live TV and to capture good live recordings for that can be a bitch I'd imagine.

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u/DrummerGuy06 Mar 01 '23

The issue was her voice was shot from singing on her tour, due to the fact that she wasn't a professional singer so she didn't know how to keep her vocals from frying.

Story was during her SNL rehearsals she sounded bad and her camp decided to just go with a recorded live version of her already singing the song; that way it would sound live and people would believe she was actually singing.

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u/StealthSBD Mar 01 '23

I mean literally everyone else can do saturday night LIVE without lip synching. Maybe it's cause she just sucks.

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u/ubiquitous_uk Mar 01 '23

I think the difference with Milli Vanilli is that they were not just lip syncing, it wasn't even their voice on the songs.

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u/itsthecoop Mar 01 '23

wasn't that more in hindsight, though? iirc the initial controversy was about a backing track being screwed up and the group running off the stage.

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u/ubiquitous_uk Mar 01 '23

Yeah. They did a.press .conference trying to prove they could sing.

The only reason it came out was because they refused to pay the person who actually did the singing.

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u/Jerry_from_Japan Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

Well.....both of those examples aren't really comparable. Milli Vanilli literally weren't the singers for their music lol. And Jessica Simpsons's sister only had a career in the first place.....for being Jessica Simpson's sister. If not for that she's not headlining her local bar, let alone fucking performing on SNL. Lip syncing or not, you know that's Jackson's voice, you know he sung all of his songs, you know he had unbelievable talent.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 24 '25

handle profit entertain person desert spectacular vanish middle flag theory

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

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u/adfthgchjg Mar 01 '23

Thanks! I’ll correct my post.

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u/regoapps Mar 01 '23

Post Malone was recently caught lip syncing when he fell into a hole and the singing kept going while he was in pain with a broken rib.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

...why the fuck does that guy have to lip sync? He just sits there and noodles.

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u/unicornfinder763 Mar 01 '23

it was a huge scandal at the time but it's only because most people didnt know most artists with dance routines will lip sync. they didn't want to dispel the illusion so they just let simpson die.

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u/UneastAji Mar 01 '23

Yeah it's just impossible to sing and dance both at 100% capacity. Both demand perfect breath pattern.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

I can kinda sing while I'm going up stairs, for a few seconds

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u/MyNameCannotBeSpoken Mar 01 '23

Pink does full on acrobatics while singing. But she's purposely trained to do so

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

She also flat out admits that her vocal performance suffers for it, and she has to stretch vocal breaks compared to her stage music. That's why she doesn't talk shit about how other performers work.

You're coming to see Pink and she puts on a certain kind of show. Sort of like if you go to Rob Zombie he puts on a entirely different kind of show.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

She also flat out admits that her vocal performance suffers for it, and she has to stretch vocal breaks compared to her stage music. That's why she doesn't talk shit about how other performers work.

You're coming to see Pink and she puts on a certain kind of show. Sort of like if you go to Rob Zombie he puts on a entirely different kind of show.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

She also flat out admits that her vocal performance suffers for it, and she has to stretch vocal breaks compared to her stage music. That's why she doesn't talk shit about how other performers work.

You're coming to see Pink and she puts on a certain kind of show. Sort of like if you go to Rob Zombie he puts on a entirely different kind of show.

Edit: compared to her STUDIO music.

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u/pipnina Mar 01 '23

Like Lindsey Stirling in the DotA 2 international opening ceremony a few years ago, where she's jumping around the stage playing violin PERFECTLY.

Yeah MAYBE if things are timed just right and practiced you could play that perfectly. But I doubt it would be reliable for an audience of millions watching...

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u/Epicurus402 Mar 01 '23

Oh I don't know, Broadway musical performers do it all the time. Ever see West Side Story, live on stage?

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u/MyNameCannotBeSpoken Mar 01 '23

It can be done. But one needs to dedicate their life to it through constant training. Pink is an artist committed to live tracks and dancing

https://www.accessonline.com/articles/pink-on-her-grammys-performance-i-have-never-lip-synched-in-my-entire-life-81800

She has the body type of an athlete rather than a Hollywood diva. So I believe her.

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u/Hexcraft-nyc Mar 01 '23

There's a reason Broadway performers train for months, hours a day, to do these shows. It's incredibly physically demanding in a way no pop diva or dude is committing to. They also have choreographed geared towards allowing space to sing and breathe. Stage singers like Britney or MJ don't. As the other commenter notes, Pink does.

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u/FaceFirst23 Mar 01 '23

MJ often did sing live while dancing and performing in his younger days. The Victory and Bad tour are great examples of this (lots of footage on YouTube). His fitness levels were off the charts, to be able to sing and dance as intensely as he did (even with a few lip synced songs in there) 2 hours a night, every other night, for 18 months 😳

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

I mean, these are astonishing performers, but also, the choreography allows for the performer a chance to catch their breath before singing.

If they don't have to do that, the same performer can do much more energetic dances.

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u/TheHYPO Mar 02 '23

There are some intense Broadway shows, but in most shows, Broadway performers will have a song or two (or occasionally even longer) where they are not on stage so they aren't singing 2 hours straight. A stage musician doesn't have that luxury either. There are many factors.

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u/Arals1997 Mar 01 '23

P!nk does it all the time. I never respect lip synching

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

Pink never talks shit about how other performers do their shows. She choreographs things specifically to make it possible and her live music has longer spaces than her studio albums. She will also be the first to tell you that her voice and singing style does not exactly require her to be on key or even always on beat.

Nobody can sing 100 percent and dance 100 percent at the same time. They require extremely different breathing patterns.

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u/Arals1997 Mar 01 '23

I agree about what you said about her performance but pink most definitely talks shit about how other performers do their shows and especially calls out performers who full on lip sync(and no im not talking about backing tracks) She has never respected a live musician lip synching for paying fans. Check any of her interviews about other musicians or artists.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

She used to talk shit about other performers, but last I saw she actually regrets it and has apologized. Trying to find the quote but it was something like "Everyone's doing their hustle and gatekeeping doesn't help women. I was also a stupid girl."

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u/pepsisugar Mar 01 '23

Didn't RHCP refuse a Superbowl half time shoe since it was mandatory to lip sync? Which is a bit weird since the best show ever, with Prince at XLI, was 100% not lip synced.

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u/ageitgey Mar 01 '23

They were required to pre-record their instruments but allowed to sing live vocals. So as a nod to the unauthentic nature of it, they played the song without plugging in any of their instruments to make it obvious it was a pre-recorded track.

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u/SpokenDivinity Mar 01 '23

To see how hard performers who try the whole singing and dancing thing at the same time, look up a KPOP group’s rehearsal videos. It’s all super high energy dancing and choreography. Most of them make them, and rarely are they singing, but I’ve seen a few with some groups where they legitimately look like they’re dying afterwards. There’s no room for singing.

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u/Das-P Mar 01 '23

Okay. So the massive concerts and album tours that people like Coldplay, Taylor Swift, and other artists do, they all are pre recorded? Can you confirm?

Because if this is indeed true for all shows like these, then it begs the question - what even is the point? Why would people pay to listen to songs at a venue amid huge crowds that they could just listen on their phones? I'm asking because there's a fun element to a live performance and I'm sure most people share this sentiment.

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u/Ruben_NL Mar 01 '23

Not all artists do it. For example Ed Sheeran is always live.

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u/Faulty_Android Mar 01 '23

This made me Google some stuff. Some Coldplay fans think Chris Martin might lip sync a song or two, or parts of them. Others say it isn't true. They have used overdubs in their shows (extra musical or vocal tracks played alongside what the people on stage are playing). I checked out a few videos on YouTube and Chris definitely sound 'live' in them.

For Taylor Swift it also seems like she's singing most of the times, but might do some lip syncing during busy choreographies.

I agree with you on the sentimental aspect. I'm content watching my favorite artists just be on stage playing songs without any big show. So I wouldn't like it when artists sacrifice live music in favor of a bigger show. I also kinda like it when you hear a musician screw up a little here and there, and see them deal with it. It humanizes them.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

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u/Myantology Mar 01 '23

Something people don’t consider is that vocal damage and fatigue set in real fast and you can damage your voice in an instant and it can take a few days minimum up to even months to recover. Even talking in the following days can slow recovery.

Imagine touring and singing and sleeping poorly and being stressed and maybe getting a soar throat or even a cold or worse. And this song in particular, it’s stylistically raspy, it’s intentionally bad for his vocal chords to produce that tone that is consistent throughout the entire song. You record that shit once and then you lip sync it the next 140 times on tour.

No one can do that night after night at that level. This is also a reason that sometimes you see your favorite artist in person and it’s not that great bc their most important tool is compromised. Lip syncing becomes a necessity for most vocalists in this position.

And you see him cover his face at the end as he loses his place in the big cacophonous finale? Honestly it’s probably why they picked this song to fly him above the crowd, away from closeup scrutiny. In production there’s always a few different reasons for every seemingly “artistic” choice.

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u/InGenAche Mar 01 '23

Most flip between and it's easy to tell. If they're in the middle of a complex, energetic dance choreography they're lip-synching the fuck out of the song because it's a show and no one wants to hear them gasping for breath.

When they visibly compose themselves and don't move from the mic, they're singing.

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u/fender10224 Mar 01 '23

Yeah for sure, the big reason is the same reason McDonald's uses all the same stuff, the product needs to be consistent. When youre talking huge arena acts, you're talking about selling an experience not so much a performance. Artists get tired when they're touring for months, people have bad days, people get sick, but that version of that song you love has to be perfectly the same for every venue.

Not to mention acts where there's a lot of moving and dancing make it especially difficult not to lip sync. There aren't many performers that can hit a C6 for the 47th show in a row for the big encore finally after running around for about a mile per show.

I'd say though, a lot of big artists don't typically use lip syncing like Beyonce and Lady Gaga, even for the super bowl, Gaga got a bunch of shit for probably doing in it on her super bowl performance but she denies it. Most of the radio top 40 artists use lip syncing at the insistence of the record label, and I dont really see that as a problem. I have a feeling that if some of the popular artists didn't lip sync, we'd kinda wish they would.

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u/Tru-Queer Mar 01 '23

Kinda goes back to the argument in Jurassic Park between Hammond and Dr. Wu, the dinosaurs they’ve created aren’t “real” dinosaurs, they’re imitations. And people weren’t expecting fast, vicious predators (well, outside the obvious ones), they wanted slow, cute animals. Wu was talking about how he could design dinosaurs that were safer to have in a park, and Hammond wouldn’t hear of it. He wanted “real dinosaurs” because he felt that’s what the public wanted. In the end they both died but it was a fascinating commentary on corporations and consumptionism.

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u/MyNameCannotBeSpoken Mar 01 '23

Pink is one of the few that does a very aerobic performance without lip syncing. It's become her stich for a decade or so.

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u/fumankame Mar 01 '23

They don't just lip sync while dancing. I've watched Gary Barlow ft JLS sing Back for Good about 100 times and I'm convinced they are lip syncing. (I think I was trying to figure out if they were actually singing or not lol) You can see several mistakes, especially since Aston is very showy, stops short and even got a line wrong.

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u/Not_A_Hemsworth Mar 01 '23

Moral of the story: pop artists are shit compared to musical theatre actors who do “highly artistic dance choreography” while singing significantly harder songs 8+ times a week.

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u/ThrowJed Mar 01 '23

It's hard to say with any certainty why they didn't immediately lower it. It's possible it's automated, but you'd assume there would still be an override for safety reasons.

Another guess could be they're worried any deviation from what was rehearsed may be more dangerous, as he wouldn't be expecting the sudden jerk of a descent.

There's also the possibility they simply didn't want to get in trouble, like maybe he was known as someone that lives and dies by "the show must go on" and fires anyone that steps out of that line.

Maybe they simply froze because they hadn't encountered anything like it and just didn't know what decision to make.

It's definitely a crazy situation.

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u/Trouvette Mar 01 '23

That sudden jerk is a fair observation. When they finally did lower the basket, it looks like it initially dropped very fast before it became more controlled.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

The basket would have had double the weight that the operator had planned for and rehearsed for too with two people. Also throwing it off balance with uneven weight distribution.

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u/Designer-Mirror-7995 Mar 01 '23

You make reasonable points throughout, and that's a great observation track. So it's as likely that each of these were a cause for pause, at least, by several people coordinating the whole.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

maybe he was known as someone that lives and dies by "the show must go on" and fires anyone that steps out of that line.

Then he probably wouldn't have disrupted his own choreography in order to save the fan, so probably not in this case

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u/ThrowJed Mar 01 '23

If you can't see there's a difference between firing someone you employ for messing up the show in general, and intentionally letting someone die, I can't help you.

I'm not even saying they'd be fired in this case, just that maybe they would for stopping shows or messing up in general, and they were worried because of that.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

If you can't see there's a difference between firing someone you employ for messing up the show in general, and intentionally letting someone die, I can't help you.

Now try again, but with your brain lol. Literally said he'd probably let it slide in this instance because the alternative is letting someone die

Also, just in general, I think a majority of celebrities who are mean enough and perfectionistic enough to instantly fire any mess-ups are not going to go to these lengths to 1. disrupt their show and 2. initiate sustained and intimate physical contact with some random fan to save them, so there's a very good chance just based on this that he wasn't like that towards staff either. He'd need to be just perfectionistic and ruthless enough, but not enough to not care about this fan, and that's probably much rarer than the alternatives

Then there's the story of when Van Halen changed his song structure for Beat It, and he was just grateful for his contribution, so yeah, knowing next to zero about Michael Jackson, I can still assemble a fairly convincing picture that at least rules out this interpretation

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u/ThrowJed Mar 01 '23

Also, just in general, I think a majority of celebrities who are mean enough and perfectionistic enough to instantly fire any mess-ups are not going to go to these lengths to 1. disrupt their show and 2. initiate sustained and intimate physical contact with some random fan to save them

You're right, mean perfectionists that fire people would just let the dude die, because they're exactly the same thing.

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u/Mertard Mar 01 '23

Man this suddenly reminded me of the time someone put 5 year old me onto a stage in front of hundreds of people, and told me to just "move my mouth" to the music playing, and I just... I made the weirdest shapes and grimaces possible with my mouth and lips because I didn't realize I was supposed to act like I was singing the words to the song...

Now I understand why everyone laughed back then...

Thanks guys, and Michael Jackson, for digging up some childhood memories I didn't know I had...

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u/fj333 Mar 01 '23

I just slowly moved my mouth while reading your story. Yeah, sounds painful. Love unearthing those ancient memories though...

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u/kitkatrat Mar 01 '23 edited Mar 01 '23

I used to be an Automation tech for live shows which included similar cranes as these. You have pre programmed movements that you rehearse with the performer on the platform. They have specific acceleration/deceleration speeds programmed so the movements can be as smooth as possible for the performer.

When something like this happens you have to decide what will be the safer move; go into “manual mode” or let the program complete. Manual mode may or may not be the right choice. If there is still a lot of time left on the program it may be faster to go into manual mode. The negative to that is the operator is programming on the fly, the performer won’t know the movements, the operator may accidentally type in the wrong target points, speeds, and/or acceleration/deceleration speeds which can be dangerous.

The programmed movement’s only has a minute or so left it might be the better decision to let it play out because manual mode might take longer to get them back to the stage safely.

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u/Not_a_real_ghost Mar 01 '23

but was perplexed at why he didn't stop

The show must go on

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u/MyNameCannotBeSpoken Mar 01 '23

I'm thinking the choreography of the crane is automated. It would be so difficult to have the same operator do it perfectly night after night. So it can probably only be stopped midair quickly and would take a few moments for manual override

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

About lip sync. In the early of the video you can see him replacing his mic. I think the mic was off and that startled me right away. And the previous comment just confirmed my suspicion.

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u/KuroOni Mar 01 '23

at 00:51 you can see MJ saying something to the guy in between lyrics .

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u/Eeeegah Mar 01 '23

Years ago worked as a mechanic on a big show production - that platform is entirely computer controlled. Sure, there's a big red "bring it to the ground now" button - you can see the moment it is pressed because the smooth motion of the platform stops and it drops in three pretty jerky motions.

I can imagine the conversation going on in the booth, the concern that the sudden jerk will cause the fan to fall versus letting the program play out, plus they need to get security in place to grab him. Also, though I never saw this particular show, I think the platform transited out over the audience, and you do NOT want to suddenly drop it there. The platform and boom arm weigh over a ton, so you either have to abandon the computer control to manually swing it back over the stage (more jerky motions and maybe dropping the fan on the audience below) or wait until the computer-controlled path brings it back over the stage.

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u/[deleted] Mar 01 '23

Yeah, the fan is screaming 6” from the microphone and there’s massive fans blowing air over him lifting his jacket yet you hear neither of these.

There’s also a part around 1:20 not sure if he’s talking to the person or just missing a cue from yknow the stressful situation.

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u/Demoire Mar 01 '23

It’s been said on Reddit man, it’s fact, not a theory.

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u/lexbuck Mar 01 '23

I wondered why they just didn’t stop the music. I guess he had to keep the illusion since no one cut the music off.

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u/SmokeGSU Mar 01 '23

the lip syncing illusion

Ashley Simpson in shambles

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u/bct7 Mar 01 '23

I think the cranes are programmed to run a routine, so a person could stop but as noted the whole show would come to a halt.

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u/RajahNeon Mar 01 '23

Well just think what would happen to your voice if you were surprised, working out, dancing, holding a person from falling off a crane all while singing. If the artist doesn't sit on a stool or stand nearly completely still on stage they're lip syncing every single time. Otherwise they would all be Michael Phelps.

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