Category: Cat Stevens


Single Song Sunday: Cat Stevens’ Trouble
(w/ Eef Barzelay, Marissa Nadler, Kristen Hersh & more!)

September 24th, 2011 — 10:15 pm





It’s been a tough few weeks, for body and spirit. Our inner city school is badly overstocked this year, with classes too full to manage, and hallways that ripple with energy we can barely control; the stress among the faculty is sky-high, and we’re hard pressed not to take it out on each other. Limping into such an environment every morning puts me at a severe disadvantage, but limp I must: I seem to have torn something in my knee, trying to compensate for a flared disk in my lower back, and have grow accustomed to a constant haze of low-grade pain.

If I was a more soulful man, I suppose, I’d be singing the blues. But I’m a folkfan, at heart; turning to the darker, sparser branches of the singer-songwriter movement soothes my breast better than anything else. I’ve been steeping in Nick Drake, Elliott Smith, and other thin outsider voices, trying to find the perfect representative to speak my pain into being, and calm it through the communion of folk.

And then the playlist skipped, and I remembered Cat Stevens.

We first covered the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens way back in 2007 here at Cover Lay Down, citing his uncanny ability to put words and melody to peace, love, and a connection to the earth as ample evidence for continued consideration of the soft-spoken singer-songwriter as one of the most significant artists of the 20th century. But Stevens does loss and loneliness too, as evidenced by the bitterness of Wild World. And I will ever be floored by Trouble, this week’s Single Song Sunday subject: a majestic piece, elementally simple, surprisingly soaring, an apt and adept personification of the fickle fates that beset the universal everyman, written when the artist was 19, during a year of convalescence following a near-fatal bout of tuberculosis

The newest addition to this canon of coverage comes courtesy of Eef Barzelay (recently featured here), whose recent foray into Kickstarter promotion produced not only the intended EP of Journey covers, but a bonus disk of songs selected by generous patrons, who shelled out $150 for the right to select songs for Eef to take on. Barzelay’s torn, mournful take on Trouble is both a perfect sampler for that LP-length collection and a powerful reminder of the potency of the song itself.

Pair it with Lisa Haley’s Zydeco-Cajun country, the Holmes Brothers’ sweet blues harmonies, Bruce Robison’s sparse country ballad, a summery jam from Widespread Panic, crashing indie waves from Kristen Hersh, electric guitar folk from Eddie Vedder, a mellow, as-yet unattributed folkrock cover once thought to be by Oasis, and delicate takes from Marissa Nadler and Elliot Smith, and you’ve got a set that once again proves the flexibility of great songwriting.



8 comments » | Cat Stevens, Single Song Sunday

(Re)Covered: More of and from…Cat Stevens, Neil Finn, The Wainwright Family, and Bill Morrissey

November 30th, 2007 — 01:28 am

I certainly wasn’t planning to post four times this week. But I’ve unearthed some great-but-late cuts that just begged to be passed along. And this past holiday weekend left me feeling thankful for all those who write and say such nice things about Cover Lay Down. Guess the urge to keep giving was just too much to bear.

Today, the second installment in our (Re)Covered series, wherein we recover songs that dropped through the cracks too late to make it into the posts where they belonged. Enjoy!

I’ve had several requests for the popcovers I mentioned in last week’s Cat Stevens post — they’re not folk, but Stevens is, and both Natalie Merchant and Sheryl Crow have folk cred (the former from her recent solo work, the latter from her early pre-stardom days). So here are Peace Train and The First Cut Is The Deepest. Along with a sweet, ragged, just-unearthed version of Wild World by antipopsters The Format. Plus Australian indiefolkers New Buffalo‘s slow, grungy acoustic take on that Nina Simone song that Yusuf covers, just for comparison’s sake. Oh, and a wonderful, sparse, sleepytime Here Comes My Baby cover from previously featured kidfolk songstress Elizabeth Mitchell. Ask, and ye shall receive, and then some.

  • 10,000 Maniacs, Peace Train
  • Sheryl Crow, The First Cut Is The Deepest
  • The Format, Wild World
  • Elizabeth Mitchell, Here Comes My Baby
  • New Buffalo, Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood (orig. Nina Simone)

I also picked up a few wonderful solo acoustic covers from Neil Finn last week that I couldn’t resist passing along; they would have been great bonus songs from our October feature on the songs of Neil and Tim Finn, if I’d had ‘em, but that’s what our (Re)Covered feature is for. He’s not folk, and neither are the original artists of these two pop songs, but the brightly optimistic singer-songwriter treatment Finn gives these two pop songs would be perfectly appropriate on any folk festival stage in the country.

  • Neil Finn, Billie Jean (orig. Michael Jackson)
  • Neil Finn, Sexual Healing (orig. Marvin Gaye)

Lest we lose sight of our core mission, here’s some folk covering folk: a wonderful Bill Morrissey and Greg Brown cover of Hang Me, Oh Hang Me I rediscovered just after posting Bill Morrissey’s tribute to Mississippi John Hurt. It’s a traditional folksong you might recognize as covered by the Grateful Dead under the alternate title Been All Around This World; I’m saving that for a long-overdue Garcia and Grisman feature, but in the meantime, here’s another sweet version of the same song by new neotraditionalist Canadian alt-folkies The Deep Dark Woods.

  • Bill Morrissey w/ Greg Brown, Hang Me, Oh Hang Me
  • The Deep Dark Woods, Hang Me, Oh Hang Me

And finally, not one but two beautiful songs which really speak to the whole twisted family dynamic of the Wainwrights, who we featured in our first Folk Family Friday. First, in a burst of typical irony, Rufus and Martha cover father Loudon Wainwright III’s One Man Guy, then — just to show there’s no hard feelings — Kate and Anna McGarrigle once again bring together family friend Emmylou Harris and ex-spouse Loudon for a jangly take on the traditional Green, Green Rocky Road.

  • Rufus Wainwright w/ Martha Wainwright, One Man Guy
  • The McGarrigles, Green, Green Rocky Road

As always, all artist links here on Cover Lay Down go directly to the artists’ preferred source for purchasing music. Please, folks: if you like what you hear, both here and out there in the wild world, buy the music, and support the continued production of incredible sound from those who eschew the easy top 40 route to fame and fortune.

1,043 comments » | (Re)Covered, Cat Stevens, Elizabeth Mitchell, Emmylou Harris, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, Loudon Wainwright III, Neil Finn, Rufus Wainwright

Covered In Folk: Cat Stevens / Yusuf Islam (Jack Johnson, Kristen Hersh, Gary Jules, Johnny Cash)

November 21st, 2007 — 08:33 am

I shouldn’t have to tell you about the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens. Though his albums haven’t sold much since his conversion to Islam in the late seventies, his songs remain firmly in the popular psyche, both as soft-oldies radio standards and as fodder for the interpretive skills of newer generations. Of the latter, the best cuts include those from the popworld, and they tend to hit the charts about once a decade; depending on who you ask, these might include 10,000 Maniacs rockin’ cover of Peace Train, and Sheryl Crow’s recent chartbusting re-remake of The First Cut Is The Deepest.

Though I saw 10,000 Maniacs in the right era to have seen their Peace Train live, I was born too late, and came to folk rock too late in life, to be a true Cat Stevens fan. With a few exceptions — most notably his 2006 pop album An Other Cup, his first mainstream release since 1978, which includes a gorgeous, brooding, poignantly yearning cover of Nina Simone’s Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood — the music he’s produced since a near-death experience caused him to change his name to Yusuf Islam, while beautiful in its own way, is truly designed for less Western ears than my own.

And though his back catalog continues to garner recognition, the Western world hasn’t been kind to Yusuf Islam the man. His chance for a triumphant return to the global stage was stolen when he was bumped from Live Aid in 1985 after Elton John went long. He made the news in the late eighties for comments which were perceived at the time as support for the fatwa against author Salman Rushdie, and again in 2004 when the US refused to pull him from their no-fly list, which tainted this icon of non-violence with an unproven association with terrorist causes.

But the more I encounter his older songs through the performance of talented others, the more I appreciate his skills as a songwriter — and the more it becomes evident that an uncanny ability to put words and melody to peace, love, and a connection to the earth has always existed in Cat Stevens.

Such is the lot of the great cover: while it stands on its own as a performance, it also reminds us of the genius and truth of those that pen and first perform those songs. And such is the lot of the coverblog, too, for as long as there are still folks out there who think Sheryl Crow was covering Rod Stewart, it falls to us to set the record straight. What better way to do so than to celebrate those who, like Stevens himself, eschew the electric guitar wail, preferring instead to find the simple, melodic core of these songs, that quiet, spiritual peace which made them beautiful and memorable in the first place?

Today, then, the folkworld’s best stripped-down Cat Stevens covers, which expose the heart of song and songwriter through the acoustic and the slow. And bonus songs: the aforementioned Cat-as-Yusuf cover of Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood, which serves as a powerful response to a Western world from an Islamic ambassador of peace who has himself been misunderstood, and a sweet solo acoustic cover of Where Do The Children Play from Jack Johnson woven skillfully into one of his own. You won’t hear these songs on the radio, but you’ll be glad you heard them.

  • Kristen Hersh, Trouble
  • Gary Jules, How Can I Tell You
  • Eli, Morning Has Broken
  • Johnny Cash w/ Fiona Apple, Father and Son
  • Liz Durrett, How Can I Tell You
  • The Holmes Brothers, Trouble

Yusuf Islam‘s 2006 An Other Cup is a stellar return to pop and circumstance well worth owning; keep reading to hear a choice cut, and get his entire catalog here.

Throwing Muse Kristen Hersh‘s majestic Trouble lends a modern indie sensibility to an old standard; find it on soloproject Sunny Border Blue.

Gary Jules brings his subtle orchestration and an uncanny Stevens-esque vocalization to How Can I Tell You on out-of-print all-cover Valentines Day compilation Sweetheart 2005: Love Songs.

Christian folksinger Eli bends Morning Has Broken — a hymn made famous by Stevens — just barely enough to sweeten it; thanks to Tim for promoting song and singer.

Johnny Cash and Fiona Apple collaborate to bring us a memorable, raw Father and Son retold through the haze of time. From Cash outtake collection Unearthed.

Liz Durrett‘s breathy-soft, tinkly How Can I Tell You is available from her website; pick up her three solo albums while you’re there.

Today’s genre-appropriate take on Trouble from rootsy folk/bluesmen The Holmes Brothers is available on the previously mentioned Crossing Jordan soundtrack, but you can and should buy their 2007 release State of Grace from Aligator Records.

Today’s bonus coversongs:

  • Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam covers Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood (orig. Nina Simone)
  • Jack Johnson’s Fall Line segues into Where Do The Children Play


272 comments » | Cat Stevens, Covered in Folk, Eli, Fiona Apple, Gary Jules, Jack Johnson, Johnny Cash, Kristen Hersh, Nina Simone, The Holmes Brothers