Carry on singing

It's easy to become blasé about the rights we are afforded in a democracy, rights that are denied so many people in the world. The right to free speech. The right to vote. The right to murder Don't Cry For Me Argentina while reading the lyrics from a screen and being heckled by your friends. The right to karaoke is truly a fundamental one, so have pity on the people of Vietnam.

In Hanoi, the Ministry of Culture and Information has just drafted legislation to close down the hugely popular karaoke parlours that are dotted around that country. "Eighty per cent of karaoke bars in Vietnam harbour negative phenomena that could affect our culture in the long run," Le Anh Tuyen, director of the ministry's legal department said this month. "Police have discovered that many karaoke parlours actually serve as brothels, or as intermediaries for call girls." And then the clincher: "Many songs do not have pleasant lyrics."

You would wonder from this whether officials are as bothered by prostitution as they are by the likes of Christina Aguilera's Dirrty, the lyrics of which could quite reasonably be described as unpleasant. As one local karaoke impresario pointed out, if prostitution really is the problem, surely they should get rid of massage parlours, not karaoke parlours. Or they should shut down those venues which are providing microphones with call-girls on the side.

It got me thinking about how much we take karaoke - the lovely literal translation is empty orchestra - for granted. There are some people, I am told, who have never done karaoke at all. I myself have enjoyed karaoke in a variety of places. In the early hours of the morning in New York's East Village and in the Kremlin - the gay bar in Belfast as opposed to the Moscow landmark. I've sung my heart out in a grotty bar in Portrush, Co Antrim, and in the Windjammer, a tiny pub off Pearse Street in Dublin where the artform of karaoke is given the respect it deserves.

Once, in a dedicated karaoke club in Winston Salem, North Carolina, I scored so highly on the clapometer I was asked up to do the finale of Summer Lovin' with the owner playing Travolta to my Newton John. To this day it's the highlight of my karaoke career, apart from the time I won a karaoke competition with my version of Ronan Keating's When You S(h)ay Nothing At All. Itshamazing how you canshee right through ma heart. Gets them every time.

The reason karaoke became so popular in Asian countries is that audiences there tend to listen respectfully when someone has gone to the trouble of giving them a tune. We, on the other hand, are far less confident about exposing ourselves in front of crowds that are considerably less tolerant of sub-standard warbling. But while Vietnamese fans are being stifled, closet fans here have been thrown a lifeline. It's called Karaoke Box and it's well worth singing about. I heard about it from my sister, who was walking past a new restaurant in Dublin the other day and saw Karaoke Box written discreetly on the sign. She rang me straightaway. "Could this mean ?" I asked. "Maybe," she replied. "I'll be there in 10," I said.

Ten minutes later we walked into the Japanese restaurant and were disappointed to find no sign of a karaoke stage or so much as a microphone. The waitress approached, and when we asked whether they did karaoke, she led us downstairs to the private karaoke booths. That's right, karaoke fans, booths which you can hire by the hour, a place to sing privately, to your heart's content.

I rounded up the troops. Brother, sister, sister-in-law, sister's friends. For two hours that evening we entertained ourselves with songs from every decade. We paid homage to everyone from The White Stripes to The Carpenters, Sinead O'Connor to Johnny Cash. My own personal highlight was discovering that I do a passable version of Lulu's To Sir With Love, while the brother impressed with A Boy Named Sue.

It wasn't all plain singing. With just a lone fan whirring in the corner, the booths get unbearably stuffy and some nerves were frazzled. As the temperature rose, I confess I got a bit too attached to the microphone, causing the sister to remark I was more karaoke Nazi than Queen and the brother to swear he was never going karaokeing with either of us again. But not being from Vietnam, we don't have to fight for our right to fight in a private karaoke parlour. And for that we should always be grateful.

The Karaoke Box is in the Ukiyo Bar and Restaurant on Exchequer Street, Dublin, 01-6334071. Private booths, €25 per hour. Free lunchtime introductory sessions.