This is yet another new development in The History of Marketing Music--a track from an album of remixes. Because, of course, if you wanted the tracks the first time out, you obviously are willing to get them again, remixed by special guest DJs. Of course, if you're giving your music away....
She Makes War is the stage alter-ego of one Laura Kidd. I imagine she's British--the biography on her website is very light on actual, you know, biography--and calls the music she makes 'grungy, dystopian gloom punk.' You wouldn't know by listening to this track, which seems bright and airy, very techno and given an extra lift by Kidd's vocals. Kidd's got one of these voices that would not have seemed out of place in the early 80's dance community, and placing her in the middle of a good beat, some soaring synth and good ambient atmospherics and she seems anything but gloomy no matter what it is she's singing about (from what I can tell--the site does not contain any lyrics--the song is about that old standard, The One That Got Away The Singer Wants Back). This is good, solid techno-pop, which is fine for what it is.
This is another one of the songs in this year's cycle you can have for free. It's part of Disarm Remixed, a remix album that takes her latest album and filters it through several DJ's and producers. If you want to hear these versions, go to bandcamp and download the whole album for free.
Here is the video for the original version....it's a little slower, and a little darker, eschewing the synths in favor of a guitar heavy arrangement and an emphasis on echo-chambery effects on the vocals but a lot of what I found engaging--including her voice--still endures.
I will be upfront here in admitting that I am not one of these people who genuflect in the direction of Bruce Springsteen. Oh, I like him well enough, and I like a number of his songs; it's just that, much like Adam Carolla, I think his palette tends to be limited.
That being said, one of my favorite songs of his is 'Atlantic City.' This is Bruce trying to channel his dear friend--and my personal hero--Warren Zevon, and channeling him exceedingly well. This is a great example of blue collar noir, a story of a man so desperate in his poverty that he's about to travel down to the titular, mobbed up place because he met a guy and is going to do a favor for him to find a more prosperous life of crime. Yes, it's a terrible choice, but the POV character--caught in a marriage gone cold, and with 'debts no honest man can pay'--has come to believe it's his only way out.
Now, as is tradition, before we begin our discussion of these covers, here's the original....
I will always be chilled by the assurance that 'everything dies, that's a fact/but everything that dies maybe comes back,' backed up by those distant, echoey howls of Bruce.
Flash forward to a couple of years ago, and the album War Child-Heroes, a benefit album where a major artist handpicked a new artist or band to cover a song of his/her/theirs. Bruce Springsteen chose The Hold Steady....and here's their version.
I've always said that The Hold Steady were the best Bruce Springsteen cover band that never existed, and here's your proof. Lead vocalist Craig Finn's performance has much of the same quality as Springsteen's and there's a definitive continuity to the original....
But there are certain choices made by the band that makes this version their own. The Hold Steady swaps out Springsteen's plaintive guitar strums for a piano, which gives the song a larger, fuller sound. They add a very Clarence Clemmons-esque sax solo, a choice that enhances the Springsteen-iness while also separating it from the original. I guess the fact that this is undisputably a band playing the song makes it unique right from the start--the impression I got from the original is that its the inner monologue from the POV character with those echoey howls is his conscience, the 'everything that dies' he debates about in the chorus, protesting his choice; with the fuller arrangement that sense is gone.
For a while, the Hold Steady version was my favorite version of the song...and then an Australian duo recording under the name Charlie Horse released their version. There's no video, but you can stream (and download, as it's free) the song here:
MAN, I love this version. Once more, we have a band that makes distinctive musical changes to the arrangement. Instead of the piano, we now get this ominous, primal drum beat that makes you feel like it's the literal end of the world...which, to our POV character, it is. The guitars here are tortured, and are a successful stand in for those echoey howls I loved in the Springsteen orginal. The whole arrangement during the chorus has this tumbling, falling quality that reflects the imploding buildings we saw in the Springsteen video. And the vocals of Crystal Rose...
Can I say I'm in love with this woman's voice on this song? Part of it is that Rose, unlike so many people who try to cover Springsteen (including The Hold Steady's Craig Finn), doesn't try to emulate The Boss, which creates an entirely new vibe for this, and an entirely new backstory here. The fact that we've got Rose's throaty, more defiant growl puts a different nuance to that key line about doing a favor for a guy...while we imagine the nature of the favor is going to be more carnal, we also imagine that said favor is going to result with our little Crystal gaining more of an upper hand than Springsteen's down on his luck schmoe. Since its her making herself all pretty, it might not be a mission of resignation, but of empowerment and revenge.
I honestly thought no other version of this song would replace the Hold Steady's as my favorite cover. I thought wrong. And I'm really, really happy that I was.
Okay, not really. But this is a rarity--a band that the music press got really, really overexcited by on the basis of an initial single proved to be pretty damn good.
That single was 'I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor,' and I was one of the many, many people who really, really liked it. I was also one of the many, many people who bought Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm Not, their major label debut. And imagine my surprise to find in the Arctic Monkeys a group that seemed to take up the Brit-pop banner put down by Oasis, Blur and so many other 90's bands. Bouyed by the honestly unbeautiful vocals of Alex Turner, the Monkeys showed a great deal of verve in their pursuit of guitar-based pop, and I became a fan. Known for some eccentric song titles (this one is actually staid compared to such winners as 'Perhaps Vampire Is a Bit Strong, But....,' 'Fire And The Thud,' 'Crying Lightning,' and perhaps my favorite, 'Fake Tales Of San Francisco'), I've been keeping track of their progress ever since.
And this...this is a beautiful lil' cameo of a song. Supposedly inspired by a chance meeting Turner had with a couple while he was walking about, this is a frozen moment in time...and a moment that could either go on forever or end. And the beauty of this song is that Turner gives us both sides--the 'this is wonderful' side ('Juliet was just the icing on the cake') and the 'this'll end up in tears' side ('I'm sure you could have made it a bit better on your own')....and then points out that only the couple themselves will know. While it is pure Brit-pop, the lyrical structure calls back to earlier British popular music traditions--one could see Ray Davies coming up with a similar concept for a song on Something Else By or The Village Green Preservation Society. It's songs like these that make me a fan of the Monkeys, that short-story-with-a-backbeat sensibility that infuses all their songs and makes them unique to the band itself. While many lesser bands will be covering 'I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor' ad infinitum, I like to think only Mr. Turner and company can make a song like this sound like it should.
No video, but here's a live radio performance, while the band was publicizing the album the song came off of, Humbug...
