What Do Nick Drake and T-Pain Have in Common?
Producing a compelling album of cover songs is a feat rarely achieved. Firstly, there’s more than one way to go about it: there’s the single artist paying tribute to their various inspirations, or the compilation of various artists celebrating a single artist’s influence. But few and far between are submissions of each example that live up to the grandeur of, say, Patti Smith’s Twelve or 2001’s Poet: A Tribute to Townes Van Zandt. It is exceedingly rare that we get such a strong showing from each category mere months apart. But The Endless Coloured Ways, a tribute by various artists to the work of Nick Drake, and T-Pain’s cheeky On Top Of The Covers, which showcases the R&B heavy’s velvety vocals, are both deserving of our attention, if for very different reasons.
While one endeavors to rejoice in the beauty and importance of an artist’s impact–a meditation on the rippling effect that great art can produce, the other signifies an internal journey for an exploratory artist and something of a personal redemption arc. Both deliver.
Nick Drake’s influence has been echoed through, and referenced to, by a large chunk of folk and indie acts since his untimely death in 1974. The scope of that influence is easily represented by the sheer range of artists on the soon-to-be-released compilation The Endless Coloured Ways: The Songs of Nick Drake. Some moments of inspiration that you might expect crop up: finding Guy Garvey, Ben Harper, AURORA, or even Feist on a compilation of Nick Drake tracks wouldn’t come as a huge surprise. Yet, some features certainly do surprise, and oddly enough they tend to be the tracks that over-deliver.
Fontaines D.C. 's haunting rendition of “Cello Song”, for instance, is all the evidence one needs for why the quintet of Dubliners’ stock is soaring. It is as mature a composition as it gets, with a driving beat and droning guitars, complimented masterfully with catchy chants and the effectively moody cadence of frontman Grian Chatten. Let’s Eat Grandma’s wonderfully warbling electro-minimalist cover of the popular “From The Morning” stands as another powerful adaptation. The UK duo turn down the thundering percussion customary of their typically bombastic “experimental sludge pop” sound and softly sing an ethereal rendition of one of Drake’s most beloved ballads over soothing synth swells and a pulsating bassline.
Other shockers include Liz Phair’s grit-pop rendition of “Free Ride”, Bombay Bicycle Club and The Staves’ team-up on “Ride” and Camille’s cafe-core arrangement of “Hazey Jane II”. The album is everything a tribute album should be, spanning genre and generation to encapsulate the scope of a young phenom’s power in such a short space of time. Every artist takes time to make each song an adaptation rather than a copy, and the magic of music takes over, making this compilation more than just a cover album.
T-Pain is doing something much less heady or serious (one look at the album cover says as much), and the only way to hate it is to have a deadly aversion to fun. The days of his candidly discussed depression following comments from fellow R&B superstar, Usher, that he “fucked up music for real singers” by popularizing auto-tune heavy productions, seem to be behind him. And this album is a statement maker. As if his Tiny Desk appearance wasn’t enough to combat his pigeonholing, our old friend Faheem has put together 8 covers that defy any assumptions of his range. The auto-tune isn’t gone this time around, but instead tucked into the background harmonies, seemingly showcasing its usefulness and effectiveness as a tool in R&B, but he decidedly keeps it from the forefront. He seems to be asserting that he’s made a contribution, while maybe admitting he laid it on too thick. More importantly, he is out to prove he is a “real singer”.
From Sam Cooke to Sam Smith, from Journey to Black Sabbath, T-Pain is determined to sing exactly whatever the hell he wants on this album, and do it well. It's also clear he isn’t afraid of the camp involved with making an album like this, and the fun he is having with it is audible. The undeniable truth is that he brings something interesting to the table on each track.
He opens with “A Change Is Gonna Come”. Bold. But if he was trying to make a statement about his vocal talent, he comes out swinging with this one. His stripped-down version of “Tennessee Whiskey” (which he refers to as a Chris Stapleton song, but we’ll forgive him) has the essence of walking into an empty church to find the immensely talented choir keyboardist crooning their heart out, unaware that they have an audience. It’s flashy and indulgent, almost to the point of being overboard, but it’s one of the most enjoyable ways to experience the old country stand-by before it transitions into a fun twist on Sinatra’s old standard, “That’s Life”.
In fact, the transitions are what are perhaps most impressive, because they shouldn’t work. Each is delightfully jarring, and to listen to this without a tracklist and letting it surprise you is the way to go. What makes it all work is the common denominator: T-Pain, himself. His voice–his actual voice–weaves through each of his arrangements to give a through-line that keeps you on the ride. The only misstep comes in “War Pigs”, but the problem is in the mix–Faheem still brings supreme energy to the metal classic. It's quite a leap for someone used to mastering different instrumentation, but it leaves the track lacking in a way that the others overcome out-of-genre. Still, at the end of the day, T-Pain has made his point in a way that’s just plain enjoyable.
So, what do Nick Drake and T-Pain have in common? They are both the worthy subject of two new entries into the esoteric pantheon of the cover album canon. I, for one, am happy to have them there.
