I Believe in a Thing Called Love

I don’t remember how or when I stumbled across Lemar’s version of I Believe in a Thing Called Love, but it hooked me.

The soulful throwback to Marvin Gaye in the intro. The “God you’re touching me” falsetto. The perfect accompaniment of a single guitar. Epic.

It was at least a year before I realized that this song is a cover. “Cool,” I thought, “the original version is going to be awesome too.”

It wasn’t.

The original version written performed by The Darkness was fine. But not epic.

Don’t get me wrong. I love glam rock. David Bowie, Mott the Hoople, Queen. It’s all great. But The Darkness didn’t do it for me. Perhaps because I had been spoiled by the superior version of their only hit song.

Let’s compare and contrast the two versions of I Believe in a Thing Called Love.

Length

Lemar 3:27
The Darkness 3:28

Winner: The Darkness

Popularity
Based on Spotify plays as of publication.
Formula: 1 play = 1 point up to 1,000,000 plays. Every play over 1,000,000 = -1 points.
I’m too hipster for mainstream drek.

Lemar < 184,000
(This one is so far off the mainstream radar that it’s not even in Lemar’s top 10 songs.)
The Darkness -63,369,994

Winner: Lemar

Lyrics

I Googled both “I Believe in a Thing Called Love The Darkness” and “I Believe in a Thing Called Love Lemar”

That’s when I noticed an intriguing difference in the lyrics.

Do you see what I see?

Notice the chorus:

Lemar:

I believe in a thing called love
Just listen to the rhythm of my heart

The Darkness:

I believe in a thing called love
Just listen to the rhythm of my hart

WTF is a hart? I didn’t know, so I did some research.

Definition of hart
: the male of the red deer especially when over five years old : stag — compare hind

“Hart.” Merriam-Webster.com. Merriam-Webster, n.d. Web. 8 June 2018.

That’s right. The Darkness is singing about a deer. Don’t believe me? Check the screenshot of the actual search results.

I appreciate wild animals as the next environmentalist hippy, but the rhythm of a deer (even an aged male red deer) isn’t something that proves a belief in a thing called love. Not in my book, anyway.

Winner: Lemar

Now that you’ve read my comparison – what do you think? (Ignore the fact that Lemar didn’t make a music video with spaceships and aliens).