I think she’s using a teleprompter for the spoken part (I understand that they’re quite inexpensive nowadays), but still - it’s one single take, with a fixed camera. Remarkable.
And I love her singing voice. I want to compare it to Karen Carpenter. It’s not as good (can anyone match?), but it’s… effortless and very smooth, the way KC sang. I’m certain it takes a lot of effort to make it that effortless.
She mentions that one when it comes to the solo.
Speaking of Carpenters:
They covered the Jeff Barry-Ellie Greenwich song “I Can Hear Music” with Carl singing. Absolute perfection.
Their arrangement of “Superstar” by Bonnie Bramlett and Leon Russell is as close to perfection as a pop song can get.
Is “Superstar” a cover?
I do miss her. I was a teen when she died and it was my first exposure that anorexia was a thing. I had a hard time wrapping my head around it.
How about “Sleepwalk” by Santo & Johnny and covered by one of the best guitarists ever, Les Paul (instrumental). It’s a real treat…he’s so good.
Sure is. Delaney and Bonnie and Friends played it on their tour and released it as a B-side in 1969. In 1970 Rita Coolidge sang it on Joe Cocker’s Mad Dogs and Englishmen live album. The Carpenters did it in 1971.
Here’s a fun version of The Talking Heads’ Road To Nowhere performed on New York balcony:
Great cover - I love that guy, I’ve seen most of his clips. Here’s After Midnight.
Tracey Ullman’s cover of Kirsty MacColl’s “They Don’t Know” is great fun, but some prefer the more poignant sound of the original. What say you?
The sales failure of the original record is the most notorious example of a record label torpedoing an artist out of sheer spite. And that’s a pretty damned high bar. Ullman saved the song from obscurity and at least secured some healthy songwriting royalties for MacColl.
I’d be interested in reading more about that if you’ve got a reliable link about it. Thanks!
According to the producer of that record (Liam Sternberg) McColl was refusing to sign a long term contract with Stiff Records. Despite reaching number 2 in radio airplay, Stiff didn’t press enough records to even put it on the UK sales charts.
The Wikipedia cite for that is:
Balls, Richard (2014). Be Stiff: the Stiff Records story. London: Soundcheck Books. pp. 178–180. ISBN 978-0-9575700-6-1.
Thanks for that!
I remember at the time thinking "Kind of a throwaway song, but the video’s so fun that I’ll …
… keep watching MTV in hopes that it comes on again. And make my sister watch til the end!"
In what sense is this a Wikipedia cite? This gives the title, author, publisher, date of publication, location of the publisher, and the pages of the book that are relevant. This allows you to find a source for claims about the relation between MacColl and Stiff Records. That’s nice, but it’s not a Wikipedia cite.
I meant the cite I found on the Wikipedia article. My personal knowledge comes from elsewhere (probably a podcast or YouTube video).
Which Wikipedia entry has this cite? I just checked all the relevant Wikipedia entries. None of them mentions this book.
Footnote 4 under references.
O.K., thank you.
Thought this was a great cover of Me and Bobby McGee, no monitor, no mics, no amps or speakers: