Nov 292024
 

Cover Classics takes a closer look at all-cover albums of the past, their genesis, and their legacy.

Suddenly Last Summer

Jimmy Somerville, should you need reminding, was the idiosyncratic voice of both Bronski Beat and the Communards, a high and pure countertenor, falsetto even, frayed at the margins. His was an altogether extraordinary instrument, capable of drawing an emotive heft other ranges can’t always supply. With Bronski Beat very much derived within an electro footprint, the Communards cast a much wider musical palate, with textures freely shared out between HI-NRG, R’n’B and chanson, all with an ear on commercial hooks and sheer joyous exuberance. Which, given some of their subject matter, was a feat in itself.

It is somehow galling to appreciate that “Smalltown Boy,” likely Somerville’s most recognized song, stems from all of 40 years ago. He left Bronski Beat the following year, the duration of the Communards then merely three years. While his solo career never quite hit the heights of either of those two bands, the six albums he released between 1989 and 2015 showed he was still in the game. He has also dabbled in acting and busking, and he’s remained the political firebrand, often for gay causes. Indeed, his last recorded work was a 2021 cover of “Everything Must Change,” for London-based charity End Youth Homelessness, which shows his voice remains as striking as ever.

Somerville released a cover album, Suddenly Last Summer, in 2009. It didn’t chart anywhere, even in France, the French aways holding his torch reliably until then. It is both easy and hard to see how it sank with such little trace. Easy? Well, with little to trouble any sweaty clubbers, the acoustic format and the choice of material might prove too demanding for casual fans. Hard? Maybe my bias, but the eclecticism of the songs, featuring songs better known by The Doors, Deep Purple, Cole Porter and Patsy Cline, amongst others, is dauntingly brave, the often spare arrangements starkly impressive and, how can I put this any more simply, his voice. He nails ’em. Or the vast majority of them.

The chances are that many readers will be unfamiliar with Suddenly Last Summer. The songs on it were all chosen by Somerville personally, all songs close to his heart, rather than the ideas of his producer or management. This, and the evident passion from within the grooves, make it one that should at least invite curiosity.
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Jul 192024
 

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

Deep Purple

Well, actually not Deep Purple’s “Hush” at all, even if that is the version that cuts most traction. It’s also the only song that lingers from the pre-Gillan iteration of the UK titans, from when they were carved in soap rather than rock. The learned and erudite know that it was written by Joe South, that doyen of southern soul, but it isn’t even Joe South’s “Hush,” as he didn’t get around to putting it out, himself, until two years after the first recorded version, itself a year ahead the Purps. That honor went to Billy Joe Royal, a recording artist for Royal Records, where South was then a jobbing songsmith. Indeed, “Down In The Boondocks,” Royal’s biggest chart success, was also a South composition. But “Hush,” from Billy Joe Royal Featuring Hush, in 1967, did not chart.

However, Ritchie Blackmore, guitarist for Deep Purple, heard that version. He would later tell Vintage Guitar Magazine, “I thought it was a great song, and I also thought it would be a good song to add to our act, if we could come up with a different arrangement…. We did the whole song in two takes.” Despite being a British band, it bombed at home, but soared in the States, reaching number four on the Billboard chart, effectively making their name, even if the singer and bassist were shortly to step aside. Most UK listeners had to wait until the band re-recorded the song, with their new line-up, in 1984.

Irrespective of all that, Blackmore is quite correct in his assertion as to the greatness of the song, and it has racked up a roster of cover versions. Here are the best five, at least today. (Please note this does not include the version by Kula Shaker, as, regardless of the red-blooded interpretation, it is all rather too much in thrall to the Deeps, as I will this time call them, struggling to find a suitably uniform diminutive.)
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