CD: Shelby Lynne, Just a Little Lovin' (original) (raw)
The cover album is a largely thankless undertaking for any artist with an ounce of personality. What to do? Stick to stiff, respectful interpretations of well-thumbed classics? Nudge the edge-o-meter into the red without radically offending anyone's sensibilities? Or perhaps set about dismantling the originals with a meat cleaver and putting them back together blindfold? Whatever your favoured approach, it's a slippery business. The likes of Bowie and Costello are hardly alone in having stumbled badly in the past; even Patti Smith laid down a criminally straight hand with last year's Twelve
The good news is that neither indie-soul queen Chan Marshall (aka Cat Power) nor country-soul siren Shelby Lynne are inclined by nature to bow their heads in reverence. While Lynne would appear to be on a hiding to nothing by tackling the venerated Dusty Springfield songbook, Marshall generally veers well off the beaten track in choosing her material; and even in familiar territory - as when revisiting her own 'Metal Heart' from Moon Pix - she has a tendency to burn the map.
Nobody who has heard her radical live reinterpretations of songs like 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door' will expect her to approach this album brandishing a straight bat. Rarely less than bold and interesting, when it works Jukebox is electrifying: her reimagining of Hank Williams' 'Ramblin' (Wo)man' as a haunted soul ballad pitched somewhere between Portishead's 'Glory Box' and Aretha's 'Do Right Woman' is extraordinary; versions of Lee Clayton's 'Silver Stallion' and James Brown's 'Lost Someone' confirm she captures stillness better than almost anyone. On the other hand, her karaoke-straight reading of 'Woman Left Lonely' turns Janis Joplin into Elton John, while 'New York, New York' is unsuccessfully reborn as swampy blues.
All the while her voice remains compellingly raw and mutinous. Part of the appeal of seeing Marshall live is the realisation that everything could fall apart at any moment, and she brings that same tension to Jukebox. In this regard the album makes perfect sense: several songs fade out abruptly mid-line, sometimes before they've worked up a full head of steam. It's also why, despite moments of greatness, it remains a patchy, rather careless-sounding piece of work. The frustrations are encapsulated by her version of Bob Dylan's 'I Believe in You', reborn as a Stones-y rocker. It could have made a wonderful song, except it sounds like it was recorded at the end of a rehearsal as a stumbling afterthought and then simply left to fend for itself.
Lynne's Just a Little Lovin' shares Jukebox's deep sense of blue-ness, but otherwise couldn't be more different. This is a meticulous record, each note weighed and measured, while Lynne and producer Phil Ramone favour the standards. There was never much chance of 'Swahili Papa' making the cut over 'The Look of Love', which partially explains the threat of over-rationalised, LA session-man hell that, on paper, hangs over the entire enterprise.
Thankfully, at its heart is a singer who has already demonstrated - on I Am Shelby Lynne and Identity Crisis - that she instinctively understands how to communicate emotion. Lynne could probably imbue 'Agadoo' with terminal loss and longing, and songs of this calibre can only bring out the best in her. In general, she adopts a less-is-more approach and casts a hush of melancholy over everything. On 'I Only Want to Be With You' this means ditching the endearing, parping cheesiness of the original for soft, sultry bossa nova, unsure whether to relish or resent her surrender; on 'Breakfast in Bed' it simply means teasing out the real desperation in the lyrics.
This approach is not flawless. Just A Little Lovin' would benefit from the occasional upward gear change - Tony Joe White's swampy 'Willie and Laura Mae Jones' is the only real mover. And like Marshall, Lynne also brings a new original composition to the table. But while the lilting 'Song For Bobby' fits the ramshackle eclecticism of Jukebox like a glove, the rather presumptuous interjection of 'Pretend' is an unnecessary bump on the Dusty road.
Such minor mis-steps are a fair trade-off for an album that doesn't simply doff its cap in tribute. The strength of Just a Little Lovin' lies in its refusal to jump through hoops; the emphasis throughout is on an under-expressed sadness that owes far more to Lynne's interpretative gifts than to Dusty Springfield. Lynne doesn't do big or showy, but she displays a sureness of touch that Chan Marshall, magnetic and magical though she can undoubtedly be, has yet to fully master.
Download: 'Ramblin' (Wo)man'; 'Lost Someone' (Power)/ 'Breakfast in Bed' (Lynne)