Black Cat Bone

A

First Aid Kit - America





B

Pleasure Beach - Smells Like Teen Spirit

A

B.

Now both of these I like, though FAK is hit-and-miss for me, and A lacks a bit of grit.

B is, I suppose, on the novelty side and probably won't reward repeat listenings, but it's a nice groove.

I think that 'America' is one of the greatest songs of the popular era and A is a sweet, pretty version, though one that misses the nuances and the powerful hope and loneliness in the original.
B is fun. For the first minute or so. That's all we really need.

A is prettily done and sensitive and it's one of my favourite songs, so why does it make me feel like John Belushi in that scene from Animal House where he smashes the guitar. It's all too earnest for its own good.

B was a nice idea, poorly done. It should have got really wild with the organ Jimmy Smith style, but they stuck too close to the original arrangement and ultimately didn't have the chops to pull it off. Still...

B

B

Both ok, but A.



A

B is just a curio and any interest it could have, vanished after one minute or so (except for the last part of the video).
I found A an excellent rendition and has moved me to check more from FAK.

A

I've never heard of First Aid Kit before, but I quite like what they're doing here, they're putting enough oomph into the vocals to avoid being classified as a John Lewis advert. I'm not sure it needs drowning in strings, but it's really quite lovely, and has me intrigued to hear more.

B is fun, isn't it. Do you see what they've done, they're playing a really famous rock song, but they're doing it as an instrumental with a Hammond organ. I tell you what, that is inventive, isn't it chaps? What larks. Now fuck off.

A

I seen the live-version of A during the Polar Music-award where those girls moved Paul Simon to tears with this...something they have got a knack of as they did something similar to Emmylou Harris in a tribute to her. It is quite beautiful but also a little bit sterile too.
B is not badly done though.

A

I really wanted to like A but they don’t quite make it their own. It’s still the better of the two though.

A

a - I liked the original of this very much, and I enjoy the way FAK have changed the mood and subtext of the song from one of 1960s hope and belief in the future in the country, to one of nostalgia for better times and incipient disappointment, without changing a word. But maybe I see it that way because I heard the S&G when I was 19, and this one at 69. I like the way FAK use the two voices and harmonies in a radically different way. First decent new to me track this round. 6.5 / 10
b - It's like Googa Mooga was never banned. Although he would probably have picked the James Last version. The Hammond was cool for a window of maybe a decade around the Jimmy Smith years, and passe long before the Nirvana version of this song. And as for that, SLTS is all about the lyric and vocals as far as I'm concerned, which makes this pointless. Well-played, certainly, but Reg fucking Dixon could get a decent tuneful sound out of an amplified organ (oo-er missus), although hardly anyone can put their personality into their playing, in my limited and unmusical view. 4 / 10

A

I dislike and like and dislike aspects of both of these. But I won't bang on. A reminds me a very little bit of the Roches

A

B

A