It’s not the rarest of occurrences when celebrity hops onstage to karaoke one of their own songs—Lin-Manuel Miranda, for example, did it with a Hamilton cut just last year—but it isn’t often that that celebrity makes music as weighty and ominous as Win Butler. As the lead singer of the Arcade Fire, Butler has produced some of the most haunting music of this young century, and on Sunday night he decided to sing one for a crowd of unsuspecting karaoke-goers in Los Angeles.
Wearing a flashy pair of kicks, Butler serenaded the masses with a solid rendition of “Intervention,” one of the best cuts from 2007's Neon Bible. And, wow, despite sounding on point, Butler proves here that no one is immune from the awkward staples of the karaoke greenhorn. See for yourself.
He’s doing it all: One hand in the pocket; aimless shuffling; holding the mic to one’s mouth when not singing. But, hey, what else are you going to do with “Intervention”? It’s kind of a bummer. Didn’t they at least have “Rebellion (Lies)”? “Reflektor”? “Ready to Start”?