What On EARTH? Actors Turned Singers

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Joaquin Phoenix is recording an album.

The Signs actor has been working with Charlatans singer Tim Burgess on the project, according to Billboard.com, but it might never get released.

Apparently, Phoenix’s perfectionism is holding things up.

“Demons inside himself that he wanted to expel”

Charlatans’ manager, Alan McGee, is helping Burgess to mix the album. He said that once Phoenix “learned guitar, he found that he had quite a lot of demons inside himself that he wanted to expel through music.”

“All the tracks that me and Alan worked with him on were brilliant,” said Burgess. “But I think he just keeps scrapping everything or redoing everything. I’m sad to say that I think it’s one of those records that may never come out, to be honest with you.

“It’s an ongoing thing. I’m trying to get Alan to force him to put it out at the moment, but I don’t know whether it will [get released].”

Other actors who’ve headed down music row

Although his role in Walk the Line makes this less surprising, it’s tempting to compare him to other actors who have suddenly headed down music row. Let’s review:

There’ve been so many more than just teenybopper actresses like Lindsay Lohan, Hilary Duff, Demi Lovato, and Disney’s Raven, who all turned out records with the flippancy of a teenager spending someone else’s money. The list even goes beyond professional sexpots like Paris Hilton or Jayne Mansfield, who both put out full records, with the sole intention, we assume, of capitalizing on their sexpottiness.

There is a host of legitimate actors who have turned to the microphone within the last few years, such as Scarlett Johansson, Nicole Kidman, and even Coldplay frontman Chris Martin’s gorgeous wife and Oscar winner, Gwyneth Paltrow.

Bizarre, unexpected twists from the past

Then there are all sorts of bizarre, unexpected albums from the past, like Bruce Willis’ The Return of Bruno (1987) and If It Don’t Kill You, It Just Makes You Stronger (1989) along with a couple of compilation CDs.

Then there was Jennifer Love Hewitt’s self-titled debut (and final) album. Milla Jovovich’s The Divine Comedy record, and Juliette Lewis’s band ( “Juliette and the Licks”). Did we mention the Hip-Hop put out by Jamie Foxx and Will Smith?

Robert Downey Jr. did a record called The Futurist in 2004 (the early part of his comeback?) and Russell Crowe was once in a band called “30 Odd Foot of Grunts” that had several releases; he put out a solo album called My Hand, My Heart in 2005.

Then there are all of those whose acting career was connected to music from the beginning; Jennifer Lopez, Marilyn Monroe, Miley Cyrus, John Travolta, and the Cassidys (David and Shawn) all fit into this category, and all have put out solo albums in the past.

As to those who’ve gone the other way- singers who’ve turned to acting- it’s embarrassing even to mention them, so we won’t.