I mentioned here recently how I enjoyed the way iTunes stacks your music so that you can search by title or artist or album; I usually keep mine organized by title and it’s always a pleasant surprise when I come across the same title by multiple artists that I’d forgotten that I owned. I recently noticed this set whilst looking for something totally different, it’s four versions of the same song and I was amazed by how differently each artist handled it and by the backing in each case. The song is ‘Cold Cold Heart’, it was written by Hank Williams in 1951 and reached number one on the country music singles charts. Over the years it’s been covered many times by a variety of artists and the four that I’ve accumulated are; Aretha Franklin [early 60's], Norah Jones [2002], Dinah Washington [1951] and I’ve included the original version by Hank Williams just to show what a great cover can do. They play in the following order:
1. Aretha.
2. Norah.
3. Dinah.
4. Hank.
To my great surprise I liked the original version best. I like Hank Williams anyway, but I was expecting to have my socks knocked off by Aretha’s version. I fact, Nora Jones came in second for me (I like the bass on that version)
I too was surprised by the Norah. I’ve always heard her as more a blender than a distiller. Mind I have a soft spot for Dinah’s voice, so she’ll top most personal polls.
To my not very great surprise at all, I like Hank the best too!
Just shows to go you, there’s me thinking that Aretha was home free, no competition! But perhaps it has something to do with the fact that in my vinyl collection there’s a 5 ft stretch labelled ‘Women Singers’; ain’t got many men and even fewer country men.
The organ in Aretha’s was fab. I’m not a fan of the organ when it is used for fill, but here it’s like part of a conversation with the rhythm section. Who was it?
A cover which made the US pop chart at the time was by Tony Bennett. There is a clip of Hank & Tony duetting on some US TV show.
Another great remake was by Jerry Lee Lewis from about 57/58.
Also, is a later remake a cover or a remake? My understanding was a cover came out at the same time as the original and tried to nick sales. Later versions of the song were remakes. Pedantic, moi?
I agree with you about cover versions, Mitch. But younger people don’t understand, because they don’t remember that awful era when British pop stars were manufactured and given US hits to sing, in the hope that the great British record-buying public wouldn’t know the difference. (Which they didn’t, not having an opportunity to compare them.)
To me that is a bad thing, whereas for one artist to record someone else’s song I see as a good thing. So I never use the word ‘cover’ for that. But of course I’m old and eccentric.