Aretha Covers Adele On Letterman

Yesterday some of you had strong opinions about Aretha Franklin's cover of Adele's Rolling In The Deep. Last night Franklin performed the track live on Letterman, after which she talked about her early days and missing out on performing on the Ed Sullivan Show, which was filmed in the studio that is now home to Letterman.

UPDATE: The woeful backup singer who doesn't know the words is Cissy Houston.

Aretha Franklin - Rolling In The Deep

Billboard reports:

Aretha Franklin is showing some R-E-S-P-E-C-T to her fellow divas: The Queen of Soul will release an album Oct. 21 covering classic songs from other female singers. Aretha Franklin Sings the Great Diva Classics will include songs such as Gladys Knight's "Midnight Train to Georgia," Barbra Streisand's "People" and Whitney Houston's "I'm Every Woman." The most contemporary track is a reworking of Adele's colossal hit "Rolling In the Deep," which is the first single off the album. It will be available digitally Monday [today], when the 72-year-old will also perform the song on Late Night with David Letterman. Other songs covered by Franklin include the Supremes' "You Keep Me Hangin' On," Alicia Keys' "No One" and Dinah Washington's "Teach Me Tonight." The icon's version of Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" will incorporate some of Destiny's Child's "Survivor." The opening track is Etta James' signature song, "At Last," and Franklin closes the 10-track set with Sinead O'Connor's "Nothing Compares 2 U."

Aretha throws in a bit of another diva's classic at the end.

Adele - Skyfall

Here's the full track.

A Snippet Of Adele's Bond Theme

Pawdele - Rolling In The Deep

I'm pretty sure this is an ad for something, but it's worthwhile for its production values and shot-for-shot takes on the original.

Gay Secret Behind Adele's Heartache?

Adele's sophomore release 21 has sold more than 22 million copies worldwide and is frequently cited as one of the most blistering "breakup albums" of all time. And according to an unauthorized biography, there's a gay angle to all that heartache.

The heartbreak that inspired Adele to pen her Grammy-award-winning music was inspired by an ex-boyfriend who left her for her gay friend, a new biography claims. "One thing we know is that it was a first love gone terribly bad," Shapiro writes in the book, quotes from which have been published by the Daily Mail among other publications. "Adele had professed her love and he did the same, she had known he was bisexual but, in the rush of romance, felt they could make it work. Four hours after laying their emotional cards on the table, the boy ran off with one of Adele's gay friends!"

Two of the tracks on Adele's debut release 19 were said to be about a bisexual boy she'd fallen in love with. The girl can hold a grudge.

Another Chart Record For Adele

Tomorrow Adele's 21 returns to the top of Billboard's Top 200 album chart for the 24th week, placing it in the stratosphere of only seven other albums with #1 runs of six months or longer. It was the album of the year for 2011 and is on track to repeat in 2012.

54 weeks: West Side Story – Soundtrack (1962–63)
37 weeks: Thriller – Michael Jackson (1983–84)
31 weeks: Calypso – Harry Belafonte (1956–57)
31 weeks: South Pacific – Soundtrack (1958–59)
31 weeks: Rumours – Fleetwood Mac (1977–78)
24 weeks: 21 – Adele (2011-12)
24 weeks: Saturday Night Fever – Soundtrack (1978)
24 weeks: Purple Rain – Prince and the Revolution (1984–85)

It should be noted that having the most weeks at #1 is an achievement relative to the sales of other albums in the marketplace at that time. The actual list of top numerical sales is something very different.

Shirley Bassey, Nancy Sinatra, Lulu....

Rumors are flying that Adele has signed to record the next James Bond title song. And when you think about it, who else could it possibly be?

Adele has told a French radio station she will have a new single out by the end of the year, but her next album will take "a good two years" to record. The news will fuel speculation that the artist will record the theme tune to the latest Bond movie, Skyfall. She has been the bookmakers' favourite since last year, but no official announcement has been made. Speaking to France's NRJ, the singer added she needed to find time to write the follow-up to her hit record, 21. "If I didn't write my own songs, I'd be out next week with a new album," she said. "I have to take time and live a little bit.

What's your favorite Bond song? Of the 23 films, only seven of the series' iconic title tracks made the U.S. Top 40. Carly Simon's Nobody Does It Better was one of the bigger chart hits, spending a few weeks at #2. Another that topped out at #2 was Paul McCartney & Wings' barn-burner, Live And Let Die. And it was Duran Duran's A View To A Kill that was the only Bond song to reach #1. But for me (and for many of you, I suspect), it is Shirley Bassey's 1964 trademark song, Goldfinger, which reached #8, that defines the Bond music oeuvre.

Adele Meets Brokeback Mountain

Zack Ford: "The heartbreaking mash-up nobody needed."

Adele Vs Newt Gingrich

Photo Of The Day

Spotify's Most-Played Tracks Of 2011

The top chart is America, the bottom chart is Britain. You can also see charts from around the world and the full Top 100 most-played from the U.S.

The South Korean Adele

The other contestants are SO unhappy with her talent.

(Source)

Rolling Stone's Top Singles For 2011

Eight of which I've never heard. Top albums.

Top Hit Songs Of 2011

By weeks at #1 on Billboard's Hot 100 singles chart, here are the longest-running chart toppers of the year. This year saw an unusual number of long-lasting #1 singles, hence a fewer number of songs reached the top overall.

Seven Weeks: Adele - Rolling In The Deep
Six Weeks: LMFAO - Party Rock Anthem
Six Weeks: Lady Gaga - Born This Way
Five Weeks: Katy Perry/Kayne West - E.T.
Five Weeks: Rihanna/Calvin Harris - We Found Love
Five Weeks: Adele - Someone Like You
Four Weeks: Maroon 5/Christina - Moves Like Jagger
Three Weeks: Bruno Mars - Grenade
Two Weeks: Katy Perry - Firework*
Two Weeks: Katy Perry - Last Friday Night

The above ten tracks rode the top for a collective 45 weeks of the calendar year. Rihanna's We Found Love is in its fifth week at this writing, but is out of contention for single of the year as the Billboard chart year officially ended on the last week of November. That leaves the 2011 championship slot safely to Adele's Rolling In The Deep. Of slight interest, Bruno Mar's Grenade went to number one on three non-consecutive weeks. Only a handful singles have ever done that.

Keep in mind that since the advent of Soundscan, Billboard tabulates the year-end charts strictly by sales/airplay and no longer do weekly chart positions play into it. However the weekly chart results continue to be a fairly accurate predictor of the annual rankings. Releases whose popularity straddles two chart years (i.e. Firework, We Found Love) tend to get screwed on the annual list.

*Firework was also #1 for the last two weeks of 2010.

Swag Tuesday

Courtesy of Fly Life, this week's Swag Tuesday prize is a double diva DVD package of concert films from gay icons Lady Gaga and Adele, both of which are available today online and at music/video retailers nationwide.

Adele: Live At The Royal Albert Hall

Live At The Royal Albert Hall was recorded on September 22 at the height of what has been an amazing year for Adele. Available on DVD and Blu-ray, "Live At The Royal Albert Hall" features the full 90 minute concert performance, plus special behind the scenes footage shot throughout the day leading up to the concert. The package also includes an exclusive live CD of the entire show. This is the first time all of Adele's hits and best loved songs will be on one CD plus her stunning covers of Bonnie Raitt's "If I Can't Make You Love Me" and The Steeldrivers "If It Hadn't Been For Love"

Lady Gaga: The Monster Ball Tour

Multi-platinum and Grammy Award-winning artist Lady Gaga will release a Blu-Ray & DVD copy of the critically acclaimed, Emmy Award winning HBO special Lady Gaga Presents The Monster Ball Tour at Madison Square Garden that includes exclusive, never before seen footage. Also being released is the album Born This Way The Remix – a 14 track collection of remixes by some of today’s most prominent artists, DJs and producers, including TBD and TBD. The new products are also available in a special package called Born This Way The Collection, that will include the multi-platinum 17-track record Born This Way, the brand new Born This Way The Remix album and the Monster Ball Tour DVD.

Enter to win the double diva DVD package by commenting on this post. Only enter once and please remember to include your email address in the text of your comment. Entries close at midnight on Thursday, west coast time. Publicists: If you'd like to take part in Swag Tuesday on JMG, please email me.

Seven Year-Old Boy Covers Adele

Via Kathleen Hanna:

Our Hit Parade is a once a month show at Joe’s Pub in NYC that my bandmate, Kenny Mellman hosts (along with Neal Medlyn and Bridget Everett). The basic premise is that people perform cover versions of current hits. You never know who will walk out next. This performance is by my friend Peter Yanowitz and Tenzin, who I first met when he was still in a stroller! Who knew he had THIS voice. I ruined my mascara watching this one, so be careful.

(Tipped by JMG reader Pailo)

Adele - Someone Like You

Almost a year after her sophomore album topped every chart in the world, we finally have a production video for Adele's tear-jerker Someone Like You. Trivia: This is the first purely vocal + piano single to reach #1 in the 53 year history of Billboard's pop singles chart. Many similarly sparse ballads also reached #1, but according to Billboard, all had other minor accompaniment.

Fake Adele - Angry Birds

Adele Vs. Madonna

As her sophomore release re-hits #1 on the U.S. album chart, Grammy winning gay favorite Adele is poised to dethrone Madonna as Britain's longest-running female album chart-topper.

Adele has matched Madonna's record with nine weeks at number one in the UK album chart - the longest for a female solo artist. Her second album, 21, has now spent the same length of time at the top spot as Madonna's first greatest hits record, The Immaculate Collection, in 1990. The Londoner's debut album, 19, remained at number two. Meanwhile in the singles chart, the singer's track Someone Like You climbed back up to number one. Earlier in the year she became the first living artist since the Beatles to have two top five hits in the UK single and album charts simultaneously.

(Tipped by JMG reader David)