World Cup music gets hip, will still suck

There has been a lot of discussion recently about the best and worst World Cup songs around. Now we can anticipate the 2010 World Cup will have a song with Auto Tune in heavy use.

MTV reports that Alicia Keys and Black Eyed Peas will perform at the World Cup opening in South Africa. Shakira and her hips of wonder and John Legend also will perform. There also will be a couple of African artists, but the list is heavily American (Shakira is from Colombia so I wonder how she qualified to be there.)

Imma be honest. There is no chance the World Cup theme song will be good now.

I love Alicia Keys. She’s a good artist, and she seems genuinely happy about going:

“I’m very excited about going to Africa, and the fact that the World Cup is in Africa is unbelievable for me! To be a part of that is incredible.”

That said, I’m really tired of “New York State of Mind.” Her version and Jay-Z’s version. I just hope she plays something new at this thing. For those of you (Ned) with little or no musical knowledge, here’s a taste (lyrics are NSFW so I just posted a link):

New York State of Mind

Black Eyed Peas, on the other hand, are everything that’s wrong with pop music. Fake, gross, stunted, lowest common denominator. Ick. And yet they are the top act in the country the past 18 months. Sigh. They will get the World Cup theme, I’m sure. And it’ll be as s**tty as that “Let’s Get it Started” song that was overplayed during the NBA playoffs a few years back. And I say all of this realizing that their Fergie is sometimes really hot. A taste (I posted the clean version):

It’s almost enough to make you pine for “World in Motion” to come back, isn’t it?