Cindi Lauper and Sarah McLachlan In New Recording of "Time After Time"

This morning as I was driving to work, Cindi Lauper was a guest on a local radio station, 104.5 Chum FM. I'm sure that many of you remember Cindi from her "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun" days. I was just old enough to appreciate rock music back then, and just young enough for Cindi to freak me out with her crazy hair and accessories.

It seems as though Cindi is stepping back into the modern music scene with an accoustic release titled "The Body Acoustic". I'm guessing from the title and the cover art of the album that the word "body" is supposed to evoke some amount of sexual arousal in the listener. Sorry Cindi, not then, not now.

What caught my attention, however, was one of the tracks they played from the album, which was a self-cover of her 1983 hit "Time After Time", this time accompanied by Sarah McLachlan. The first verse was Cindi alone, with that whiny, whiny voice that makes me think she's singing about not being allowed to stay up late enough to watch Knight Rider. Then Sarah sung alone on the second verse.

I was astounded by the contrast.

Say what you will about the style of Sarah McLachlan's music, there's no disputing that she's an amazing vocalist, and put beside Cindi Lauper, she sounds like she could sing the summer back into a Canadian October. When the two of them were singing together on the chorus, all I could think was "Sarah would sound much better without that dying cat in the mix".

Here's a tip for Ms. Lauper: If you want to sound good, sing duets with people who are worse singers than you. I think William Hung is available, or maybe Hillary Duff.