If I had a nickel for each actor who recorded a heavy metal album after their 90th birthday then I'd have two nickels, which isn't much but it's weird that it's happened twice.
The great Orsen Welles spring chickened out by only recording heavy metal tracks when he was 70. His excuse for not repeating that at 90 was dying not long after.
It doesn't bother me, it's fantastic that he did this, it was just objectively not very good. I'm glad his other contributions were better, and he's obviously had an illustrious career in general.
William Shatner has the most experimental, wild Spotify I've ever seen. If you haven't ever seen it, look at his discography. He does a lot of almost spoken-word poetry over soft rock, punk, etc. You get the sense that he views acting as his side hustle and is waiting for his musical career to take off.
He's also (to my knowledge) one of the only major Hollywood actors to ever star in a movie filmed entirely in esperanto. I've heard that the pronunciation is rather rough around the edges though I have no way of corroborating that.
When I watched Incubus I remember him sounding very much like he was trying to speak Italian. My only basis for comparison are some podcasts in Esperanto I've listened to, and completion of the duolingo course (I've forgotten everything).
No mention of Shatner's music career is complete without listing Spaced Out: The Best of Leonard Nimoy and William Shatner[1]. And, yes, it's exactly as -unique- as you'd imagine it might be.
William Shatner is someone I really wish I could dislike. I mean, he is certainly not a conventionally talented singer or actor. He's laughably, painfully bad sometimes.
But the man keeps going! He's one of the hardest working people in show business. He clearly takes his craft very seriously, even if he defines it a bit differently from the rest of world.
The Wrath of Khan has no business being as great a movie as it is, and his version of Common People is fantastic.
I'm sure this collaboration will be .... something else.
== Edit
I'm sure I am over-analyzing this - I do that with everything - but Common People is actually "perfect" Shatner.
When you start listening, you feel "OK, this is lame." After a bit it clicks and it becomes "Oh! I see what they are trying to do here." and by the end it becomes "Damn! This is awesome."
Shatner doesn't change throughout the performance, but everything just falls into place around him.
As I age, I look on these happy, productive seniors, people like Dick Van Dyke (100), David Attenborough (99), and Mel Brooks (99) and keep my fingers crossed.
I would never have expected that "Shatner and Henry Rollins ranting while Adrian Belew and Matt Chamberlain go absolutely wild on guitar and drums respectively" would be anywhere close to as good as it is.
Incidentally, Rollins talking about the recording[0] of it is freaking hilarious.
Well, thanks for cutting another one and a half hours from my already too short period of sleep at night and making me waste more time tomorrow at looking up more stand up shows from Henry if available.
I recall that he consulted for an unofficial (semi-official?) concept video by the Roddenberry Archive that was a finale/sendoff for Captain Kirk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgOZFny7F50 . If you're a fan of TOS, it's worth a watch.
Yup, I am a fan and watched that concept video when it came out.
I'm hoping he makes some sort of return, perhaps involving the
Star Trek Picard Season 3 reveal that Kirk's body is being kept
on ice at Section 31, on Daystrom Station. I would imagine that
there are many ways that Kirk could be brought back, perhaps
Kirk's body could have ended up being stored in a transporter's
buffer similar to how the episode "Relics" from Star Trek: The
Next Generation, Captain Montgomery Scott (Scotty) is discovered
alive in a transporter buffer after being trapped for 75 years
on a Dyson sphere. The transporter has been rigged to sustain
two life signals, allowing Scott to survive by maintaining a
diagnostic cycle. His pattern remains intact, allowing him to
be rematerialized after being rescued by the USS Enterprise.
Another possibility is being back due to meddling from the Q
or an evolved V'Ger. There's been published a comic where some
of the old crew from multiple TV projects have been brought
back to help solve the killings of some of Star Trek's Gods
by an unknown figure. Emperor Kahless is eventually revealed
to be Star Trek’s god-killer. Among the many cameos in the
series are Benjamin Sisko, Jake Sisko, Kira Nerys, Odo, Worf,
Alexander Rozhenko, Spock, Scotty, Uhura, B'Elanna Torres,
Tom Paris, Ro Laren, and others like Q, Kahless (clone/Emperor),
and crossovers with Picard-era or TOS characters. It does not
have to be a TV series but could be a limited TV mini-series.
The Star Trek financial gods wasted big money on a badly done
Section 31 movie. I don't see why they don't do something more
similar to Star Trek comic and Television canon.
If you haven't heard his Bohemian Rhapsody cover, it's something else. He flat out admitted that he had never heard the song before recording it. Which... Number one, how? And number two, who let him do that?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne:_The_Omens_of_Deat...
The great Orsen Welles spring chickened out by only recording heavy metal tracks when he was 70. His excuse for not repeating that at 90 was dying not long after.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-AMi-vCfAWw
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incubus_(1966_film)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqf04PAeFnE
1: https://www.amazon.com/Spaced-Out-Leonard-William-Shatner/dp...
For 93 that's amazing.
But the man keeps going! He's one of the hardest working people in show business. He clearly takes his craft very seriously, even if he defines it a bit differently from the rest of world.
The Wrath of Khan has no business being as great a movie as it is, and his version of Common People is fantastic.
I'm sure this collaboration will be .... something else.
== Edit I'm sure I am over-analyzing this - I do that with everything - but Common People is actually "perfect" Shatner.
When you start listening, you feel "OK, this is lame." After a bit it clicks and it becomes "Oh! I see what they are trying to do here." and by the end it becomes "Damn! This is awesome."
Shatner doesn't change throughout the performance, but everything just falls into place around him.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cMXhWf0vE7c
That cover was later remixed into this[3] piece of internet gold (IMHO).
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wI4jMxveyI
[2]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_QZe8Z66x8
[3]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-IffZh3V8oQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZL4pNtI9nM
I also really enjoy _That's Me Trying_: https://youtu.be/vjGaqFrF5Fw?si=eq_VSQXnxqXQ_Kyg
and _Real_: https://youtu.be/hsKfZ3wvLkE?si=l7FdbGCX_u8ep0Ie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XmCi_-9Shhg&list=RDXmCi_-9Sh...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXWEM4gZhg4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MAWP9Oxdn9Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HU2ftCitvyQ
Incidentally, Rollins talking about the recording[0] of it is freaking hilarious.
[0]: https://youtu.be/8zL3wtNrq00?t=4616
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ul6S84qF_TU
So, much the same bar was cleared as every other article that makes the "interesting to HN community" grade.
Rack that up to more Trekkie-adjacent and metal-heads than you might have expected.
/s