Don't Fail Me Now Review

Don’t Fail Me Now – Melanie Amaro

So I’m going to address the elephant in the room: I strongly believe reality shows based around music are rigged. I believe they are fraudulent and despite what is contractually available to the winner, the success belongs to the losers because some of the people who go home are beautiful talented singers. Mediocrity sells in today’s music industry and that’s where we find today’s artist of choice Melanie Amaro.

For the small percent of people who refuse to watch music reality show contests and only knowledge comes from the fact everyone and their mother talks about them, once American Idol took off and then quickly started sucking, Simon Cowell the judge everyone loves to hate because he seems like a complete asshole, created a show to compete with American idol called The X Factor as well as X Factor USA for the United States to get in on the action. Wikipedia claims that: 

“The concept of the series is to find new singing talent (solo or groups) where the winner is determined by the viewers through telephone, Internet, and SMS text voting and receives a $5 million recording contract with Epic Records.”

This is where I stop caring or delving deeper into the show because I don’t care about these shows and all I hear on the radio are the people who didn’t win, except for this starlet. Melanie won the USA X Factor and got the contract with Syco Music which is associated with Sony Music included in that mixture is a 5 million dollar cash payment for the recording or something of the sort.

Melanie has a great voice she deserved to win and deserves to have all the success in the world. However, I’m disappointed with “Don’t Fail Me Now.” The start of the song, the first few lines actually, signal the song was about a long journey of struggling and then there’s one last one to walk through and hoping you can find the strength to continue.

Nope it’s a cheesy love song, and I feel like it’s a disappointment. Supposedly it has been described as “an uplifting account of Amaro's road to success", the upbeat pop track features the singer talking about self-empowerment and finding a true love…” However I believe that’s just a cover up for a half assed version of what should have been a self-empowerment. 

(Chorus/ Opening)

“I've walked the longest road
So don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now
I've never got this close
So don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now
I see you in the distance
It won't be long before you're mine
I've never got this close
So don't fail me now, feet don’t fail me now”

The first half of the chorus I’m perfectly fine with, the second half of the chorus annoys the hell out of me. I love ‘love songs’ but I feel like the love element is entirely too predictable and doesn’t belong in this song. 

“I paid my dues, I paid the price
I prayed for you almost every night
You're here and touch can't seal the cracks
Come build me up and bring me back to life
Baby I'm on my way to you
Tonight, I know you been waiting for me too.” 

See what I mean, it is half love and overcoming a struggle but I feel like the love message overpowers the struggle aspect and that’s more self-empowering than oh I met someone I like and now we’re dating.” To make myself feel better I’m going to pretend that first verse was about her praying for the reunion of whoever she wants to share her fame and success with and maybe they had some personal issues to get over. The first verse is just setting up she prayed for them to get better and sort out their life so they can join her as well. It’s the best I can do with the little material given to work with. 

“I've walked the longest road
So don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now
I've never got this close
So don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now
I see you in the distance
It won't be long before you're mine
I've never got this close
So don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now”

It’s just the bland chorus again. It starts off great and then throws any potential of being awesome out the window. I am seriously in love with the “I’ve walked the longest road so don’t fail me now feet don’t fail me now,” is the best line of the song and the rest fails in comparison. Speaking of failing at life, Melanie looks like she’s fair skinned and she’s not she’s of a dark complexion and then in some scenes she looks dark again. Why the video is like this I have no idea, the whole video annoys me. 

Also it's not just this video I did an image search on Google 

and there are plenty of images where she looks rather fair skinned...

See What I mean, personally I'd be fuming

that's not what she naturally looks like

who decided she needed to be lighter?

I don't think it was her... 

(Verse 2)
“It's so surreal, won't stop until I touch your skin
Just to know you're real
One million miles is worth the time
Cause soon I'll be there to see your smile
Baby I'm on my way to you
Tonight, I know you been waiting for me too”

Here comes the love aspect of the song that I really don’t care for. I hate how it’s just thrown in there, I mean it can be implied or something but it’s overbearing the other messages. This was her debut single, the seller for her album and it’s about finding love.

After another chorus we get the bridge that kills anything the song might have had going for it.

“Counting down, I'm almost next to you
Help me now, I don't know what to do
I never thought you'd be so beautiful
I can't believe it
Now you're here it's like a miracle”

(Bridge 2)
“It's been a long road
It's been the longest road
It's been a long road
It's been the longest road” 

It’s so boring and I feel like if Melanie had written the song herself this wouldn’t so bland and not inspirational except for two lines of the chorus.

(It's been a long road; it’s been the longest road)
I've walked the longest road
so don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now
(It's been a long road, It's been the longest road)
I've never got this close
so don't fail me now, feet don't fail me now”

I hope I’m not the only person highly disappointed by the amount of talent wasted in this song. I think she should have had full creative control over it other than ‘here’s what we wrote, this is how we want it to sound, and you are going to sing it this way. Have fun releasing some generic pop song that undersells your talent.’ It’s failure, on top of failure, on top of disappointments. The song is not a bad song it’s very ear pleasing and I guess the love aspect isn’t that horrible but, it irritates me. The first million times I heard the song I only ever heard the chorus never the verses, I don’t know how or why it happened but I was convinced this was going to be an awesome song about overcoming personal struggles and whatnot. It’s only half of that… if even half can be considered overcoming a struggle. I really do like the sound of the song and I can turn my brain off and enjoy it.