Post by davidhr on Jun 24, 2014 9:03:46 GMT -5
While the past week again featured the complete absence of Lara in public, or meaningful activity on her FB site, another sign of increasing confidence in her health emerged: she is starting to add more summer concerts. In addition to her appearance at the New Wave Festival in late July (which after all will likely be lip-synced), she has now accepted an invitation to appear in Turkey on August 13. She is to be the ‘honored invitee’ at the concert of Mustafa Ceceli in the ‘Harbiye Open Air Theatre’ in Istanbul. Information about the concert can be found at: www.facebook.com/events/599039646875837/.
[According to Wikipedia, Mustaga Ceceli is a Turkish singer, age 33, who has released four albums – one can see his picture at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Ceceli#mediaviewer/File:Mustafa_Ceceli_-_Kucukcekmece_%281%29_-_Cropped.jpg].
In this case Lara will presumably be singing live; it will thus provide her with perhaps her first real test of the health of her ears. There is no indication of whether this performance will be acoustic in nature, like the ones in the fall, thereby presenting less of a challenge. The concert has not (yet) been added to her official tour dates on her FB or URL sites, although it does seem legitimate; tickets can be found at: www.biletix.com/etkinlik/RP015/ISTANBUL/tr#.U6QVPf4hM5A.faceb
With summer now officially here, most of the older fan sites have been pretty dead, bereft of activity on Lara’s part or even a good controversy to enliven them. Continuing our introduction of newer sites, ‘Notre belle Ange Lara’ is a closed group of Lara’s ‘Angels’ (as the name implies). If you fit that description, it can be found at: www.facebook.com/groups/292289927614127/
For some reason, ‘Le Secret’ has reappeared on the Belgian charts – at #199. Perhaps she’s been away for so long that ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’.
Total sales in that country have been 15,000. It’s been off the French charts for six months – total sales there listed as 57,500. Total sales in Canada, where it was on the charts for four weeks, of 2,000. Also on the charts in Switzerland for 7 weeks. So total sales worldwide somewhere in the vicinity of 75,000-80,000. In comparison with other recent releases, TLFM had an estimated total sale of 150,000; the ‘Best of’ about 80,000. EWIM, with a very limited distribution, 25,000 sales.
Now for the next three ‘best of’ videos:
Mon Desir: app.box.com/s/qhyzgvlz4ew3mlfd3f8f
Mr. President: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gWgytbYJ-k
Ne Lui Parlez Plus D'elle: www.youtube.com/watch?v=nomBMi3x95k
‘Mon Desir’ is another one of the wonderful songs from ‘Le Secret’ that has gotten short-changed (so far) by the abbreviated tour. Fortunately there are a couple of really good videos, the best one being from the complete Brussels DVD, indicated above.
As we know, Lara performed many of the ‘Mme. Zhivago’ songs in lip-synch version. Again, Lara has explained this away by saying ‘that’s how things are done there’ (which means – by Krutoi). But obviously people who paid money to go to some of these concerts did not get to hear the songs really sung live, regardless of all the musicians on stage pretending to play. That was bad enough. However, to involve children in the charade, as in the case of 'Mr. President', has to be called deplorable. One wonders whether the children were told ahead of time that their singing would not be heard by anybody. If not, that passes from deplorable to…(you fill in the adjective). If they were told, and they went along with it, Lara can be judged complicit in helping to raise a new generation of (predominantly) Russian cynics. Since a choice has to be made of a ‘best of’, the version picked emphasizes the quality of the video and ambiance, hence from the Moscow TV concert. There are others available of approximately equal quality, readily viewable on youtube, with the primary difference being Lara's outfit. A pity, because this is an uplifting song that could involve children properly, if done honestly, and could be performed in France as well. If Obama were to have had a third presidential campaign, it would have fit right in .
‘Ne Lui Parlez Plus D'elle’, from the ‘Neuf’ album, was not presented all that often, but there are a few good versions. The one chosen here is from the Star Academy. An interesting thing about this video is it shows a highly emotional ‘Gregoire’, who appeared to be overcome having sung a duet with Lara of ‘La Mama’; that video can be seen at (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUCcVdtJKvY).
An oddity about this song is that despite its infrequent performance, Lara actually created two different official videos for it – one in February 2005 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df54O_VIWPY), and then another in June 2005 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMiFj5EPlMA) in Canada. I found the first version particularly affecting. This was a time when Lara was ‘releasing’ a single from the album practically every other week – outside of the first, ‘La Lettre’, none of them ever went anywhere, and the frequent releases probably devalued them in the minds of the media programmers. This song got caught up in that environment.
We should probably expect more of the same low (no) level of activity for the next few weeks - hopefully the hiatus is contributing to Lara's complete healing.
David
[According to Wikipedia, Mustaga Ceceli is a Turkish singer, age 33, who has released four albums – one can see his picture at: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mustafa_Ceceli#mediaviewer/File:Mustafa_Ceceli_-_Kucukcekmece_%281%29_-_Cropped.jpg].
In this case Lara will presumably be singing live; it will thus provide her with perhaps her first real test of the health of her ears. There is no indication of whether this performance will be acoustic in nature, like the ones in the fall, thereby presenting less of a challenge. The concert has not (yet) been added to her official tour dates on her FB or URL sites, although it does seem legitimate; tickets can be found at: www.biletix.com/etkinlik/RP015/ISTANBUL/tr#.U6QVPf4hM5A.faceb
With summer now officially here, most of the older fan sites have been pretty dead, bereft of activity on Lara’s part or even a good controversy to enliven them. Continuing our introduction of newer sites, ‘Notre belle Ange Lara’ is a closed group of Lara’s ‘Angels’ (as the name implies). If you fit that description, it can be found at: www.facebook.com/groups/292289927614127/
For some reason, ‘Le Secret’ has reappeared on the Belgian charts – at #199. Perhaps she’s been away for so long that ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’.
Total sales in that country have been 15,000. It’s been off the French charts for six months – total sales there listed as 57,500. Total sales in Canada, where it was on the charts for four weeks, of 2,000. Also on the charts in Switzerland for 7 weeks. So total sales worldwide somewhere in the vicinity of 75,000-80,000. In comparison with other recent releases, TLFM had an estimated total sale of 150,000; the ‘Best of’ about 80,000. EWIM, with a very limited distribution, 25,000 sales. Now for the next three ‘best of’ videos:
Mon Desir: app.box.com/s/qhyzgvlz4ew3mlfd3f8f
Mr. President: www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gWgytbYJ-k
Ne Lui Parlez Plus D'elle: www.youtube.com/watch?v=nomBMi3x95k
‘Mon Desir’ is another one of the wonderful songs from ‘Le Secret’ that has gotten short-changed (so far) by the abbreviated tour. Fortunately there are a couple of really good videos, the best one being from the complete Brussels DVD, indicated above.
As we know, Lara performed many of the ‘Mme. Zhivago’ songs in lip-synch version. Again, Lara has explained this away by saying ‘that’s how things are done there’ (which means – by Krutoi). But obviously people who paid money to go to some of these concerts did not get to hear the songs really sung live, regardless of all the musicians on stage pretending to play. That was bad enough. However, to involve children in the charade, as in the case of 'Mr. President', has to be called deplorable. One wonders whether the children were told ahead of time that their singing would not be heard by anybody. If not, that passes from deplorable to…(you fill in the adjective). If they were told, and they went along with it, Lara can be judged complicit in helping to raise a new generation of (predominantly) Russian cynics. Since a choice has to be made of a ‘best of’, the version picked emphasizes the quality of the video and ambiance, hence from the Moscow TV concert. There are others available of approximately equal quality, readily viewable on youtube, with the primary difference being Lara's outfit. A pity, because this is an uplifting song that could involve children properly, if done honestly, and could be performed in France as well. If Obama were to have had a third presidential campaign, it would have fit right in
.‘Ne Lui Parlez Plus D'elle’, from the ‘Neuf’ album, was not presented all that often, but there are a few good versions. The one chosen here is from the Star Academy. An interesting thing about this video is it shows a highly emotional ‘Gregoire’, who appeared to be overcome having sung a duet with Lara of ‘La Mama’; that video can be seen at (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUCcVdtJKvY).
An oddity about this song is that despite its infrequent performance, Lara actually created two different official videos for it – one in February 2005 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Df54O_VIWPY), and then another in June 2005 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMiFj5EPlMA) in Canada. I found the first version particularly affecting. This was a time when Lara was ‘releasing’ a single from the album practically every other week – outside of the first, ‘La Lettre’, none of them ever went anywhere, and the frequent releases probably devalued them in the minds of the media programmers. This song got caught up in that environment.
We should probably expect more of the same low (no) level of activity for the next few weeks - hopefully the hiatus is contributing to Lara's complete healing.
David
