Christian Kane – Covered in Glory

Musician

I’m a huge fan of Christian Kane and his original songs but I also really love his interpretations of other people’s. He puts his heart and soul into anything he chooses to sing. Country music isn’t a big deal in the UK so I often hear Christian’s versions of a song before I encounter the original and discover that I don’t like it as much. Weird, because I’m usually someone who’s a stickler for the original, for instance, Judy Garland – Over the Rainbow; Frank Sinatra – Well, anything Frank did really. I don’t like the watered-down, limp versions common in the charts today – usually by fey songstresses with affected, insipid vocals, popularised by their ubiquity in adverts: Ellie Goulding’s bafflingly turgid Your Song; Lily Allen’s total crucifixion of Somewhere Only We Know; that awful, soulless Wherever You Will Go by Charlene Soraia.* Whereas these seem to drain the life and spirit out of the song, Christian Kane does the opposite. He invests them with more emotion and verve, making the originals sound just a little colourless in comparison. His voice is a gift – unique but with echoes of Elvis, reverberations of Springsteen. It has a depth and resonance that can reinvigorate an old song, making it seem contemporary and new and real. And it appears totally effortless. His original material showcases his talents even better but that's another blog.

* Of course there are exceptions – Adele’s Make You Feel My Love; the Byrds’ Tambourine Man; Timothy B. Schmit’s Caroline No; the Eagles’ Ol’ 55, Poco's Magnolia.

Apologies if any of these aren’t the originals you know. I’ve tried to put down the writer when I thought it relevant. Links are in the words ‘Original’ and ‘Kane’ if you want to hear what I’m talking about. Obviously Christian Kane has covered ‘ songs live that I haven’t included e.g. Sweet Home Alabama, either because I haven’t heard them, couldn’t find a good version of them or he hasn’t played them that often. 

Actor

Fast Car

Original: Tracy Chapman 

Unstoppable rhythm and melody, compelling narrative. I love her deep voice. It has a certain intensity and immediacy.

Kane studio; Kane live: A little hard to listen to owing to the enthusiastic fans singing along and occasionally drowning him out (he loves it). He still sounds tender and true. Plaintive and melancholy but that natural growl lets you know he’s no pushover.

You got a fast car/I want a ticket to anywhere/Maybe we can make a deal/Maybe together we can get somewhere/Any place is better/Starting from zero got nothing to lose/Maybe we'll make something/Me myself I got nothing to prove

The One I Love 

Original: David Gray

I’ve got to admit that I’m not a fan of his voice, thought he bleated like a lamb on his big hit This Year’s Love but this is better.

Kane: ‘Somebody else wrote this but it’s one of my favourite songs’. More rough tenderness, he always sounds as if he’s lived what he’s singing. Passion and restraint.

Next wave coming in/Like an ocean roar/Won't you take my hand darling/On that old dance floor/We can twist and shout/Do the turtle dove/And you're the one I love/You're the one I love

Wary and suspicious

I Could Never Take the Place of Your Man

Original: Prince 

The single is bouncy, infectious, unputdownable although I couldn't find it on YouTube.

Kane: This doesn’t completely work countrified (not sure about the fiddle) but it’s very lively and upbeat and it's plain CK identifies with the sentiment.

I asked her if she wanted to dance/And she said that/All she wanted was a good man/And wanted to know/If I thought I was qualified/And I said baby don't waste your time/I know what's on your mind/I may be qualified for a one night stand/But I could never take the place of your man

Mid-party?

Jolene

Original: Ray LaMontagne

Low-key, breathy, mournful but, combined with his very deliberate phrasing, it sounds a little affected.

Kane: ‘It had so much to do with my life – I just fell in love with it’. In Christian’s earnest, heartfelt rendition, there’s a memory of anguish, hard times and misguided youth that makes it affecting.

I found myself face down in the ditch/Booze on my hair/Blood on my lips/A picture of you, holding a picture of me/In the pocket of my blue jeans/Still don't know what love means

Drift Away

Original: Dobie Gray (written by Mentor Williams) Easy-going, laidback, likeable.

Kane: There’s palpable joy in the energy and exuberance in his version.

Thanks for the joy that you've given me/I want you to know I believe in your song/And rhythm and rhyme and harmony/You've helped me along/Makin' me strong/Oh, give me the beat, boys and free my soul/I wanna get lost in your rock and roll and drift away

Part cowboy

Should’ve Been a Cowboy

Original: Toby Keith

I can't really fault this. Jaunty and upbeat, a country no.1 in 1993.

Kane:‘I lost country for a while. This is the one of the songs that brought me back.’  Part-cowboy, part-Cherokee, CK rocks out, breathing new life into this song.

I should've been a cowboy/I should've learned to rope and ride/Wearing my six-shooter riding my pony on a cattle drive

Luckenbach, Texas

Original: Waylon Jennings (written by Chips Moman and Bobby Emmons), a country no. 1 in 1977.Easy-listening, old-school country.

Kane: Christian reinvents this; it barrels along with enthusiasm and gruff charm and something about his tone really reminds me of Elvis.

The only two things in life/That make it worth livin'/Is guitars to tune good/And firm feelin' women

Part Cherokee

The Dance

Original: Garth Brooks (written by Tony Arata)

Sort of middle of the road, pleasant and inoffensive, Garth has a nice, even tone that’s easy to listen to.

Kane: Only a tiny clip of this. I’d kill to hear more as this is a great appetiser. There’s a depth of experience in the few lines we have here and that twang of a Texan accent on the last word kills me. Also rate Scotty McCreery’s version which, despite his youth, still has gravitas, although not the rueful quality of the Christian snippet.

And now I'm glad I didn't know/The way it all would end the way it all would go/Our lives are better left to chance I could have missed the pain/But I'd have had to miss the dance

Redneck Side of Me

Original: Jamey Johnson (written by Jerrod Niemann)

The instrumentation is wonderful (is that an organ at the beginning?) but the vocal sounds sort of creepy, like a bad uncle, someone you wouldn't want to meet on a dark night and is too much on one level, there’s not enough drama. Great accent though.

Kane: Again, only a tantalising snippet,. In a couple of minutes, he conveys a promise, a threat, gentleness. Listen to the line: ‘I never hunted 'gators in the Everglades’. The softness and timbre of his voice make my throat quiver. 

I never was a roughneck pumpin' crude down the line/An' I ain't logged no timber, sawin’ on them Georgia pines/I can't mix the best batch of etouffee/I never hunted 'gators in the Everglades

(Aside from Wikipedia: Étouffée or etouffee is a dish found in both Cajun and Creole cuisine typically served with shellfish over rice.)

'Country music has always been first and foremost in my heart'

I think my main point is that Christian Kane always sounds more than credible because he chooses songs that mean something to him. And he can sing anything. I’m mystified as to why he hasn’t had a huge hit although I know that talent doesn’t always translate into success and am probably not the best placed person to try to fathom the machinations of the country music business. But he’s personable and appealing and let’s face it, fine-looking. By rights, he should have ‘made it’ with any of his original songs, such as A Different Kind of Knight, America High, Rattlesnake Smile or with Let Me Go (written by Casey Beathard and Tom Shapiro), which he begged to be allowed to sing. Part of me thinks it’s because he has more than one string to his bow being an actor too (maybe Nashville doesn’t like the fact that he isn’t solely a musician, that he wants to have his cake and eat it too); part of me thinks it’s owing to the extreme dedication of his fanbase (to some extent drawn from fans of his acting that have got into the music) – it’s possible that this contributes to the mainstream country/rock industry’s failure to take him seriously; or perhaps he’s just refusing to play by the rules. I’ve been watching Nashville and wondering why he hasn’t got one of the major roles. Perhaps they wanted musical newcomers but he would be a shoo-in for a recurring cameo of a roughneck country rocker, perhaps on the wrong side of the law.

Could it be?

I’ll end with this exchange, which sort of sums Christian Kane’s music up.

My Dad asked me what Christian Kane's music was like. I said 'It's country rock' and he said 'Like the Eagles?' I said 'More country' and my sister added 'And more rock'.

Perhaps he’s just too much of each to be fully accepted by either (having played to rock audiences at the Viper Room). But they say this is The Year of Kane. 

He also features in another blog of mine:

http://sshh-sshh.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/opinion8-songs-about-school.html.

Another blogger’s take on CK live: http://bashfulbadgersblog.wordpress.com/2013/11/21/christian-kane-rocks-out-at-the-jazz-cafe-in-camden/.

Thanks to Wikipedia, Kane Nation, A-Z Lyrics Universe and CMT. 

Christian Kane’s music is available from: www.ChristianKane.com.

 

Opinion8: Protest Songs

A blog that lists 8 of the best/worst/most common of any example, including songs, movie clichés, movies, best characters and so forth, some with explanation, some needing none.

So, here are my eight favourite songs with a message, songs that highlight an issue, a condition or a cause.Links to the songs in the titles.

1 Bullet and a Target – Citizen Cope
Vital, immediate, intelligent, heartfelt, you can't beat Citizen Cope. There’s so much going on musically when you listen carefully. I particularly love the syncopated handclaps.

‘Mrs Dalai Lamas/Another sister's shootin' heroin tomorrow/Amputees in Freetown, Sierra Leone's/The church wasn't honest/The state put the youth in a harness/Creatin' hostility among us/Teacher said no college/Still the kid's gonna get a check/With a couple of commas/People wanna bomb us/More people gotta scatter and run from us’

The second to last line quoted I heard as ‘People want Obamas’ which I think is even better.

2 For America – Jackson Browne

Passion and disillusion, a fiery combination. Lights the touchpaper every time. Jimmy Guterman calls it ‘both a prayer and a love song, which damns 'a generation's blank stare.’

‘I have prayed for America/I was made for America/Her shining dream plays in my mind/By the rockets' red glare/A generation's blank stare/We better wake her up this time’

3 Redemption Song – Bob Marley

This version reminds me of how I used to listen to Bob Marley songs, taped off the radio, playing on a small radio cassette recorder I insisted on carrying round everywhere, even on country walks, to my Dad’s dismay. A song that transcends age, gender, class and race with consummate ease, that is as at home on my radio cassette as it is at the ATP Tennis Players’ Party in Monte Carlo.

‘Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery/None but ourselves can free our minds’

4 Sign o’ the Times – Prince

Love the spirit, love the lyrics, love the tone, Prince’s show and tell, with urgent vocals and laidback beat, is totally compelling.

‘In France a skinny man/Died of a big disease with a little name/By chance his girlfriend came across a needle/And soon she did the same/At home there are seventeen-year-old boys/And their idea of fun/Is being in a gang called the Disciples/High on crack, totin’ a machine gun’

5 Streets of London – Ralph McTell

A plea to us all to recognise the suffering of others and stop feeling sorry for ourselves, his gentle strumming and what sounds like a lot of echo on his voice somehow make this even more convincing.

‘In the all-night café/At a quarter past eleven/Same old man sitting there on his own/Looking at the world/Over the rim of his tea-cup/And each tea lasts an hour/And he wanders home alone’

6. What's Going On - Marvin Gaye

Beginning with the ambient sound of a relaxed gathering, to set the scene. They say a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down and Marvin's honey tones and a gorgeous tune do the trick here. It sounds like peace, if peace had a sound.

Mother, mother/There's too many of you crying/Brother, brother, brother/There's far too many of you dying/You know we've got to find a way/To bring some lovin' here today yeah/Father, father/We don't need to escalate/You see, war is not the answer/For only love can conquer hate/You know we've got to find a way/To bring some lovin' here today, oh (oh)

7 Vietnam Song – Country Joe & the Fish

Oh for the days when people used to protest properly, peacefully, over things that actually mattered.

‘Well, come on all of you, big strong men/Uncle Sam needs your help again/He's got himself in a terrible jam/Way down yonder in Vietnam/So put down your books and pick up a gun/We're gonna have a whole lotta fun’

8 Abraham, Martin and John – Marvin Gaye

More of a lament than a message song but simple, melancholic and conducive to contemplation.

‘Has anyone here seen my old friend Martin?/Can you tell me where he's gone?/He freed a lot of people/But it seems the good die young, yeah/I just looked around and he was gone.’

Extract from another blog, bemoaning the lack of ideas in most current chart music. This blog can be found here.
The charts are full of these so-called songs, which consist of one refrain, sung or played over and over ad infinitum, often this refrain being a sample from an older song (so not even an original tune), usually with all the passion or feeling leached out of it, so it sounds as if it’s been sung by an auto-tuned automaton (again the Black-Eyed Peas are a perfect example with their soulless rendition of ‘Time of My Life’) and then some extremely childish rap with clichéd rhymes, for example, ‘it’s the girls on the coast, I like the most’, or words repeated ‘I see my friends, friends, friends’ or mingled with uninsightful lyrics, such as Jlo’s ‘Let me introduce you to my party in the club’. This nonsense spreads like wildfire. It’s infinitely depressing to me to think that this is all anyone wants to hear: songs with the singer boasting about how sexy they are, how they’re going to rock the club, or repeating their own names, etc. There are occasional exceptions, such as Beyoncé’s ‘Halo’ but they really only serve to prove the rule. Sometimes there’s a snatch of a pleasant-enough tune but the mindless drivel of words that accompanies it is like Chinese water torture - it infiltrates everything until it’s ubiquitous and erodes my will to live. Nobody wants to hear real sentiments or ideas any more. Gone are the days of wordsmiths and tunesmiths like Neil Young or Gordon Lightfoot. Or rather gone are the days when writers of such calibre could achieve mainstream recognition while expressing different takes on society or challenging ideas. In the 60s and 70s, it was considered a virtue to write something deep, moving or politically resonant. Now it’s a very difficult climate for intelligence or authenticity. There are musicians out there who are creating worthwhile songs, whose lyrics have integrity, like Citizen Cope, but the market is on the decline.

Other contenders

Ohio – Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young
For No One – Barclay James Harvest
What's Going On – Marvin Gaye

Vietnam Cowboys – Ray Davies

Angola (Wrong Side of the Law) – Ray Davies

Give Me Love, Give Me Peace on Earth – George Harrison

Old Empire – Nova Mob

A Gallon of Gas – the Kinks

Dead-End Street – the Kinks
Shipbuilding – Robert Wyatt
Flag Day – the Housemartins
One in Ten – UB40
Get over It – Eagles
Goodnight, Saigon – Billy Joel

Wistful wish-fulfilment
Harvest for the World – Isley Brothers
Give Peace a Chance/Imagine – John Lennon
Earth Song/Heal the World – Michael Jackson