‘Turn Around Bright Eyes’ Is A Book About Finding Your Voice, Learning To Love Again, And The Wonderful World Of Karaoke
Samantha Colleran, February 2020
Once upon a time I read a Rolling Stone article written by Rob Sheffield, now I’ve finished two of his books and can’t wait to start the third. Following the success of Love Is A Mixtape and Talking To Girls About Duran Duran (which is one of the many books I received for Christmas, so expect a review of that in the future!) Rob Sheffield brings to light the art of karaoke and intertwines themes of fresh starts, learning to love again, and finding your purpose through 269 pages of equal parts heartfelt and hilarious writing.
If you’ve read Love Is A Mixtape, you know that Rob lost his first wife very young and very suddenly. We now see Rob trying to piece his life back together after a sudden loss, and as a first step he moves to New York. Through miraculous twists and turns, Rob falls in love with a new girl, Ally, an astrophysicist and a fellow music lover. One of the many things that makes their love even stronger? Karaoke, of course. Rob talks about some of the songs that brought him and his wife together including “Total Eclipse Of The Heart” (pretty obvious, considering the title of the book), Depeche Mode B sides, Boy George and Culture Club, and countless others.
Rob and I are similar in the fact that we both love music more than life itself; we’ll list off random musical facts to anyone who will listen, we can tell you about one specific performance by a band we love and what makes it so special, we survive off of the existence of music, but when it comes to performing music, we can’t do it to save our lives. The great thing about karaoke, which we learn through a number of Rob’s anecdotes, is that you don’t need to be the best singer in the room; all you need is passion and a love for what you’re singing, and you become a star for the night. When you’re karaoke-ing, nobody in the room cares how good or bad you sound, they’ll hype you up and applaud for you always. That’s the beauty of karaoke, everyone comes together to uplift each other and enjoy a night of singing some good tunes.
This book not only made me appreciate the art of karaoke and its history, it made me fall deeper in love with Rob’s writing. I know as soon as COVID restrictions start to loosen up, I’m getting my ass to a karaoke bar (and hopefully one of the ones in New York that Rob wrote about)! If you haven’t read this book, I highly encourage you to go to your local bookstore and find yourself a copy of Turn Around Bright Eyes, then come back to this post when you’ve finished it and let me know how much you enjoyed it (and if you didn’t enjoy it, keep that to yourself, I don’t accept Rob Sheffield hate on this blog)! If you’ve read this book please let me know your thoughts in the comments. If you’ve ever had the opportunity to go to a karaoke bar, tell me your favorite song of the night and why you love it so much!
I loved this book and to have to chose one favorite karaoke song is asking a lot because there are soooo many good ones. I will say that watching my husband serenade the crowd with his rendition of “I Want It That Way” was pretty special and I like you can’t wait for things to open up again because heading back to the city to “perform” with friends is top of my to do list! Thank you Rob Sheffield for your relatable writing style and thank you Sam for reviewing this book!
A great memory! I can’t wait to go to my first karaoke bar! Definitely one of the first things I want to do when things start to open up again 🙂