Five Good Covers: “The Whole of the Moon” (The Waterboys)

Five Good Covers presents five cross-genre reinterpretations of an oft-covered song.

The song is older than you might suppose, originally released in October 1985, the lead single for the Waterboys’ third album This Is the Sea, Oddly it didn’t even perform that well, first time around, with an Australian #12 the height of initial success. However, boosted by a belated Ivor Novello award, for best song musically and lyrically, in 1991, it was re-released. This time it cracked the UK top echelon, if at #3.

Intriguingly, it did not trouble the US charts on either occasion, it arguably taking Fiona Apple to break the song in America, singing it on the soundtrack of TV series The Affair towards the end of 2019. Here are some lesser-known versions:

Karine Polwart — The Whole of the Moon

Mike Scott is one of those writers whose songs adapt particularly well to a female perspective and voice, and this is no different. Given I have already noted Fiona Apple, it is to Karine Polwart I turn for this evocative version. Polwart is principally a folk singer, writing often fiercely socio-political comment into her own songs, written in that tradition. This comes from a set of Scottish covers, songs from Scottish writers, she made in 2019. (We reviewed it here.) She imbues the song with an even greater sense of whimsy than the original, stripping it back, as it starts, to voice and xylophone, before the guitars come in, for her brother on 6-string and her own trademark 4-string tenor guitar. Her voice is clear and without nuance. As it unfolds, round about the 2.40 mark, it lurches into a gentle waltz, courtesy the accordion accompaniment that is then introduced. Scott is a famed as a lover of myths and magic(k); Polwart delivers the latter with lashings to spare.

Boys of a New Age feat. Katrina B — The Whole of the Moon

Techno and dance versions of songs can be very divisive and rightly so, given how execrable most can be. In truth, my jury remains undecided on this one, even as it ticks all the boxes that cliche demands, with repetitive sequencing and a spoken/chanted mid section, behind the formulaic root note bass synth and mechanical drum rolls. Somehow it still maintains an unlikely charm. This was a single, one of the only ones, from this band, a project of erstwhile (gulp!) Glitter Band bassist, John Springate. There are several Katrina Bs, but I suspect she is the now Australia-based vocal coach, who lived in the UK at the time of this release. If nothing else, it reveals the overall adaptability of Scott’s melody line.

Tom Baxter — The Whole of the Moon

This version reveals, by exclusion, the issue of so many of the male singers who approach the song, in that the irresistible tendency is to ape the frantic agitated form of delivery that Scott embraces. What Scott delivers effortlessly, others sound just histrionic. Baxter, a soft-voiced singer-songwriter goes in quite the opposite direction. It allows contemplation as you possibly absorb the lyrics more freely than Scott ever allowed. This was released on the flip of his almost hit 2004 single “My Declaration” along with a cover of Bob Dylan’s “To Ramona.”

Jennifer Warnes — The Whole of the Moon

This is one I kept on skipping, given the relative faithfulness of the arrangement. But interpretation is far more than the background noise, this version being far more around the vocal delivery, in meter and in the distinctive cadence Warnes gives to it. By attacking the tune a semi-tone away from the orchestration, it adds a certain sense of detachment that is quite different to all others. Mind you, Warnes, possibly most celebrated for her work alongside Leonard Cohen, is such a consummate vocalist as to have any number of tricks at her command making of a song her own, irrespective the author. The much-used phrase around singing the phone book, well, not only could she, but I’d probably buy it. (How is it we have never featured her Jenny-sings-Lenny set Famous Blue Raincoat in Cover Classics?) So skip it I can’t.

Nick Parker — The Whole of the Moon

There is one other version that I can’t really not include, if not so much for the quality, but for the premise behind it. Actually, the quality is fine, if not outstanding, and gives a folkier feel by far to the already folk stylisations of the original. But it is the backstory that grabs.

Parker is a music lifer, active on the fringes of the English folk/punk festival scene. In lockdown and at a loose end, he had the wizard scheme of “Stranger Tunes”: he sent a rough guide, of a whole range of songs, to various musicians he had worked with over the years. These musicians filmed and recorded themselves performing their part before Parker put them together. These videos were then released regularly, each one being in aid of charity, with the additional conceit being that none of those involved knew who else was working on their tunes until release. I think that is wonderful, and makes the iteration all the more wonderful for that. (An album is available.) For those who need to know, the additional musicians include Sound of the Sirens, Abbe Martin and Hannah Wood, a UK based female duo who are beginning, at last and 12 years of activity, to make a name for themselves.

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