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Written
by Pamela Bellmore, posted by blog admin
It’s
scarcely possible to imagine a better collection of cover tunes than Gregg
Stewart’s Twenty Sixteen. Gregg Stewart avoids one of the common pitfalls of
the form by never opting for naked imitation – his re-interpretations of other
people’s material truly reorganizes these songs to his specific vision while
staying faithful to the guiding initial impulse that drove the writing of the
songs. He, likewise, doesn’t go for the obvious songs in their respective oeuvres
– it isn’t just for novelty factor, as well, because the selections show a wide
knowledge of music that Stewart’s solo work and music with the band Stewboss
doesn’t really hint at. He gets these performances over with an immense amount
of charisma that never asks too much of the listeners. It varies enough too,
from song to song, that Twenty Sixteen takes on more of a character than just
being a concept cover album with songs from musicians who died in 2016.
Instead, it becomes much more of a statement about who Gregg Stewart is.
Some
of the odder or more unusual choices on the album will be the certain attention
grabbers. He opens Twenty Sixteen with Dead or Alive’s “You Spin Me Round” and
turns it into a tighly swaying, simmering acoustic track with more playfulness
and less slightly skewered need than we hear in the original. “Raspberry Beret”
retains more overt similarities to the original version than many songs do on
Twenty Sixteen and this stems in no small part from his decision to keep the
song’s famous melody intact and delivered with exquisite delicacy. The unlikely
pairing of Maurice White’s “Sing a Song” and Leon Russell’s “One More Love Song”
certainly isn’t accidental and the juxtaposition of Earth, Wind, and Fire soul
influences heard in the former with the bluesy southern charms of the latter makes
for an unusually satisfying one two punch. He also opts for a run through of
Gene Wilder’s signature musical number of Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory’s
“Pure Imagination”. It definitely has a much different sound than we hear from
Wilder’s original, but Stewart’s choice to revamp it as an acoustic number is
an ideal recasting.
Rather
than opting for “White Rabbit” or “Somebody to Love”, Gregg Stewart pays
tribute to the deaths of Jefferson Airplane guitarist/vocalist/songwriter Paul
Kantner and the band’s original second singer Singe Anderson. In an eerie bit
of coincidence, Kantner and Anderson died on the same day in 2016 and “High
Flying Bird” is a sturdy acoustic driven number from the band’s pre-Grace Slick
years that hangs together remarkably well in its new incarnation. Leonard Cohen’s
“Leaving the Table” is another remarkable choice than goes with a song off his
final studio album rather than mining the typical songs from his catalog for
some predictable inspiration. “Starman”, one of David Bowie’s most beloved
tunes, closes Twenty Sixteen with a remarkably faithful note that still keeps a
lot of his character involved with Bowie’s hallmarks. This is much more than a
first rate cover album; we get just as much of a sense about who he is after
hearing this song that we do listening to any of his originals.
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