courtesy Malderor in the comments:
Sounds insane on the surface- Prince's musical signature for an entire decade covered by a sprawling Scottish Celtic rock band?
But after taking a listen it makes perfect sense- the Waterboys in the 80's were deep into the intersection of the mystic and the physical, which has preoccupied Prince for most of his career. And Mike Scott's disciplined wail is a fine match for Prince's 80's delivery.
A magnificent take on a tune that, to echo Mal, I'd have thought un-coverable.
3 comments:
I saw an interview with Mike Scott saying something to the effect of, "we were such a sh!t-hot band at the time we thought we were capable of anything. Including covering the most popular song by the most popular artist on the planet. A bit arrogant, perhaps..."
as they say, it ain't bragging if you can back it up.
Have you heard any of the Yeats Project that Wikipedia tells me he's been working on?
I have heard of it, but not heard it. I'll confess that the Waterboys disappointed me rather profoundly once, when I'd convinced a whole gang of folks to go see them, and they didn't play a single song from their "classic" era. I appreciate the desire for an artist to continue moving forward, and not to dwell in the past, and blah blah blah. But he only played new material, and it was a lousy show that disappointed the hell out of everybody who saw it. (And I'll mention again that I'd convinced a number of people to attend with me.) Since then my interest in their career has dimmed. They seem to have made peace with their past, and I bought the collection of outtakes from the Fisherman's Blues era. ("Too Close To Heaven".) It's a shame that one bad show leaves such an unpleasant taint, because I saw him solo a few times before that, and he was amazing every time. It was just a weird era when he was trying too hard, methinks, to stay "relevant". You can do that and still play a couple songs people know, too.
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