And so the fug continues, lifting gradually.
I can’t be bothered with having a rant today, not even about the pitiful 1% pay rise given NHS workers in the budget this week, the same week as it was found that close to £37 billion has been wasted on the Track & Trace program, run by Tory peer Dido Harding (surely a coincidence, that) and it was also revealed that the Government had elected to settle the Priti Patel bullying case out of court, to the tune of £340,000.00 plus legal costs, all of which tells you everything you need to know about where governmental priorities lie.
Not that you’d know any of this from reading much of the press this week, who have been far more interested in trying to prove that Meghan Markle is a wrong ‘un. And it may well be the case that she is, in which case she married into the right family. I mean, it’s not like the Saxe-Coburg and Gothas Windsors are short of a few wrong ‘uns themselves, is it? Forgotten about Prince Andrew, have we?
But I’m not writing about any of that. For as the apathetic fug continues to refuse to completely leave me alone, I’ve had an appropriate song in my brain all week, a cover version, which I figured I’d post here this morning.
And then I realised I’d already written about it, albeit five years ago.
To simply repost what I wrote last time seems entirely in keeping with my lethargic state of mind, so, with absolutely no apologies whatsoever, here you go (and in case it’s clear from this, which it isn’t, this is a record I bought on 7″ single back in 1987):
*****
Some would argue that if you’re going to do a cover version, you need to do radically rework it, so that to the untrained ear it sounds like something you wrote yourself.
Substitute the acoustic guitar on the original for an electric one on your track.
Upgrade the soft folky lilt of the original for a rip-roaring rollicking rock riff.
Maybe even shorten the title by, say, one vowel.
Trim out some of those rather unnecessary verses.
And then get Rick Rubin to produce it and pop it out on the uber-cool Def Jam label:
Now, here’s the original, performed by the evil ones from The Detectorists (Yes, I am going to keep making that reference until someone gets it).
I’ll leave you to decide which you prefer:
More soon. And maybe it’ll be something vaguely original.
A History of Dubious Taste 