This coming November, a new tribute album to Pogues‘ lead singer and songwriter Shane MacGowan will be released. And to announce the album, a new recording featuring Bruce Springsteen‘s take on The Pogues’ “A Rainy Night in Soho” has been released. Springsteen’s version is a little slower than the original, and opens quieter, with just a piano, but a full band comes in, adding a lilting sound to the song, which sees it through the end. No matter the rearranged instrumentation, the melancholy, which makes the original so memorable, remains.
In a press release announcing the album, Springsteen said, “Every once in a while, every once in a great while, an artist comes along whose voice seems to speak to history itself. (Shane) was raw, hilarious, no apologies, and profound. His soul was filled with the transgressive and ecstatic properties of the saints. I don’t know who’ll be listening to my music in 100 years, but I know they’ll be listening to Shane’s.”
The album, 20th Century Paddy, will also feature new performances by Tom Waits, Hozier and Jessie Buckley, David Gray, Dropkick Murphys, Primal Scream, Steve Earle and The Jesus and Mary Chain. Half of the artists’ royalties from sales will be donated to the Dublin Simon Community, which benefits the unhoused people of Dublin.
