Songcrafters.org

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After taking on Elvis (ffs) last time out, and not coming off too well, this time I'm right back in my vocal range.

Fats Domino.

This song is actually the next song on my Rock'n'Roll Party triple CD to Heartbreak Hotel, by coincidence.

Thanks to the choir of drunken piss-heads for joining in at the end.

Great cover, Nick - nice clean vocal, and the piano in particular sounds spot-on authentic. Lots of great rock & roll music came out of New Orleans in the Fifties.

Well done!

Great job. You really nailed the piano. It sounds fab. I think details like that really make a great cover.

I was just reading about Blueberry Hill on Wikipedia and it's interesting that, although the most famous version is Fats Domino's 1956 release, this song is actually from 1940 and was recorded six time in that year. Here's the first recording which was by The Sammy Kaye Orchestra with vocals by Tommy Ryan. It was released May 31, 1940 (76 years ago!)



My personal favourite is this 1967 cover by The Dave Clark Five from their album "Everybody Knows". The vocals are awesome and the horns really make it a great arrangement.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4wCFnNDVrgQ

And check out this YouTube playlist. It has 52 different versions of Blueberry Hill by many artists including Elvis Presley, Duane Eddy, Elton John, The Beach Boys, Led Zeppelin, The Everly Brothers, Little Richard, Gene Autry (1941), and The Glenn Miller Orchestra with vocals by Ray Eberle (reached #1 in 1940). There's a really cool video from around 1957 by Nat King Cole and 10-year-old Billy Preston (who would later become famous for playing with The Beatles and as a solo artist). Another notable version is the one by Bruce Cockburn and Margo Timmins (lead singer of Cowboy Junkies). They really make it their own and I quite like it.

https://youtu.be/kxSHBIXfFPE?list=PLW61vY73IIrqa3z0gBiVRWJZattYX_ti1 (https://youtu.be/kxSHBIXfFPE?list=PLW61vY73IIrqa3z0gBiVRWJZattYX_ti1)

Great cover, perfect tune for you. That piano is pretty feckin cool, you are so good at that piano roll stuff. It strange how we approach use garage band so differently. Love this song and you've done well.
Rock on!

Very cool cover Nick.
Enjoyed this lots.
B

You pay great attention to detail, here; the music is very similar to the original to my ear.
And, it was especially nice to hear your fellow inmates joining in... ;D

Wouldn't have recognised it was you from just listening to the vocal. Good cover with some very 50's sounds going on there!.

Pete

A brilliantly executed cover of a rock n roll classic. Excellent vocal... excellent piano... excellent horn section. Basically it's just excellent!

fantastic cover nice and clear recording ..... spot on ........tonyc

Another great tune and really well orchestrated. My one niggle is that it seems (to me) the vocal is a tad dry for this backing. Please don't take this as a criticism as I think it's great, but that's what I'm hearing. Did you do that piano on the Thumbjam again? Damn impressive.

Blooby

Nice version Nick-
great recording


Tommy

Thanks for the comments everyone.

Quote from: Blooby on June 04, 2016, 07:04:56 AMDid you do that piano on the Thumbjam again?

This time it was a GarageBand piano, as were the drums and upright bass.  The horns are ThumbJam, which are my new favourite things.

Quote from: Blooby on June 04, 2016, 07:04:56 AMMy one niggle is that it seems (to me) the vocal is a tad dry for this backing.

I know exactly what you mean.  I recorded the vocal track Friday morning in the car and it had a horrible boxy cast about it.  I took the unusual (for me) step of exporting the vocal track out to my PC and manipulating it in a wav editor (I use Goldwave).  I put in a notch filter around 1-2kHz and it cleaned it up a lot, although I can still hear remnants of it.  I had a lot of trouble getting the vocal to sit in the mix.

Quote from: heg577 on June 03, 2016, 11:59:06 PMYou pay great attention to detail, here; the music is very similar to the original to my ear.

Back in the mid-nineties, when Hook was hiking up the Appalachian Trail, I was a 30 year old single man and I used to make model rally cars (when not playing my guitar).  I was quite obsessive about detail and in some respects I get the same way when I've decided to do a realistic cover.  I always think it's like doing a jigsaw, except you have to make all the pieces yourself.

It takes some special skill to get that backer sounding so true to the original. Really nicely put together, and delivered with pure class.

Fantastic.

I listened to this the other day and was duly impressed! Somehow I forgot to comment. Rectifying this now.

This sounds so authentic and great!

You are such a talent Nick !!!


love the backing vox !!!

love it all in fact !