Back in January 2010 when I was only a few posts into the blogging game I posted this song by Rowland S Howard. He died of liver cancer just a few days earlier, 30th December 2009. Rowland recorded his album Pop Crimes while ill and this song, a cover of Talk Talk's Life's What You Make It, has a slightly different perspective when sung by someone who knows their time is up.
Life's What You Make It
Aged just sixteen Rowland wrote Shivers, recorded by pre-Birthday Party band Boys Next Door. Strange to think that Nick Cave was actually this young once.
strange how nick cave turns this one into a ferry-esque croon. the great version of 'shivers' must be roland's original 'young charlatans' version. on this version you get the feeling he really was contemplating suicide.
ReplyDeleteRowland S. Howard was always one of those artist I felt was thoroughly authentic. He wore his art as well as his art wore him...He never shied from laying it all on the line. The darkness Howard sang from was real, haunting, but sometimes he found his way gloriously out in the light. He will always be the lynchpin in my love of rock that comes from the darker, seedier, grittier side of the tracks. His contributions to The Birthday Party, Crime + The City Solution, Immortal Souls and his collaborations with Nikki Sudden, Lydia Lunch and Jeffrey Lee Pierce are among some of his most uncompromising material, but his final solo album, Pop Crimes, is something I listen to a good deal. That he was in view of his own end makes the work that much more intense and very personal.
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