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Saturday 26 November 2022

Townea Covered - Delta Momma Blues

 


There were only two votes last week for the Be Good Tanyas with their version of Waiting Around to Die. However everyone who voted for Townes were very complimentary about their cover. The scores were Townes 5  BGTs 2.

Therefore Townes is still on track for a whitewash with the current scores of the door reading  Townes 4 The Rest 0. Can  fellow Texan troubadour Steve Earle do anything to stop the landslide?

Steve was always going to be a shoe in to feature here for a variety of reasons. Here are just three:

  • His 13th studio album from 2009 is called Townes and pays tribute to his friend and mentor
  • He named his late son and fellow musician Justin Townes Earle after the great man
  • He once stated that " Townes Van Zandt is the best songwriter in the whole world and I'll stand on Bob Dylan's coffee table in my cowboy boots and say that"
Any of the 15 tracks on the album (plus the additional 11 on the 2 CD version) would have been worthy of inclusion
After a great deal of thought I've gone for Delta Momma Blues which is the title track of an album which Townes released on 1989 on the Tomato label and one of the first of his records which I picked up from Echo records on Glasgow's Byres Road

Even although Steve throws some banjo (or is it mandola?) into the equation it is still Townes for me and not just for sentimental reasons.

Others, of course, may choose to differ




8 comments:

  1. I read that Steve Earle Bob Dylan quote only yesterday somewhere. The 2nd half of it is 'That may be but I've seen Bob Dylan's bodyguards and one thing you ain't doing is standing on Bob Dylan's coffee table in your cowboy boots'

    Tonnes.

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    1. Hadn't heard the second part of that quote before Adam

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  2. Townes that should say. As in I vote Townes

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  3. I like Steve's 'Townes' album very much but - with the possible exception of "Loretta" - I'm not sure any of his takes are better than the originals. So close but still Townes for me.

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  4. I mean, Steve's version is very nice and all, but... Townes.

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  5. Again, I'm going for the Townes version. I'm loving hearing his voice in the course of this series - it has a lovely timbre to it and singing sounds so effortless for him.

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