{"id":22323,"date":"2022-01-25T05:30:08","date_gmt":"2022-01-25T10:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/?p=22323"},"modified":"2022-01-24T16:16:58","modified_gmt":"2022-01-24T21:16:58","slug":"album-review-spygenius-blow-their-covers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/2022\/01\/25\/album-review-spygenius-blow-their-covers\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Spygenius \u2013 Blow Their Covers"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>When a group \u2013 especially one with a proven track record of releasing high quality original material \u2013 appears with an album full of covers, it\u2019s fair to wonder. Have they run out of ideas and\/or material? Or do they have something of value to add to the interpretation of the songs of other artists?<\/p>\n

Spygenius\u2019 latest release, Blow Their Covers<\/i>, suggests the latter. The group was most recently heard from with a superb double album, Man on the Sea<\/em><\/a>. That album showcased the British foursome\u2019s facility with songcraft, arrangement and…you get the idea. This new album focuses on covers, but Spygenius chooses to steer well clear of obvious choices. In fact unless you\u2019re the hardest of hardcore music fiends, there re likely to be t least one or two tracks here that you\u2019ll find wholly unknown.<\/p>\n

A reading of Traffic\u2019s early classic \u201cPaper Sun\u201d opens the record, and it sets the tone. The arrangement is familiar enough to anchor the song; if you know the original, you\u2019ll recognize it here. But Spygenius add enough of their own character \u2013 subtle instrumental and vocal touches \u2013 to make it their own and thereby justify the existence of this new recording.<\/p>\n

The band effectively rocks up songs that \u2013 great as they are \u2013 didn\u2019t opt for a heavy vibe in their original form. The Monkees classic \u201cLove is Only Sleeping\u201d is a prime example. They play it fairly straight on another Monkees tune (\u201cFor Pete\u2019s Sake\u201d) but the tune is so good that no changes are really needed. Same\u2019s true for a reading of Robyn Hitchcock\u2019s \u201cQueen of Eyes,\u201d though in Spygenius\u2019 eight hands, the tune leans even a little more in a rock direction than did the original.<\/p>\n

Without further research into the original versions \u2013 and hey, I\u2019ve got deadlines here \u2013 it\u2019s hard to know exactly what Spygenius brings to the table on readings of \u201cPlease Stop Talkin,\u201d \u201cMurrumbidgee Whalers” or Peter (Fugs, Holy Modal Rounder) Stampfel\u2019s \u201cGriselda.\u201d What I can tell you is that the songs sound good.<\/p>\n

A cover of Squeeze\u2019s \u201cIs That Love\u201d is pretty ace as well. But the undisputed high point of Blow Their Covers<\/em> is a remake of a long-obscure Beatles track, \u201cStep Inside Love.\u201d Written (at least primarily) by Paul McCartney and first released by Cilla Black, it\u2019s a fairly standard-issue Macca tune of the era (which is to say: better than what most other composers could come up with). The Beatles\u2019s version circulated as a bootleg for decades, and eventually saw official release on the Anthology sets.<\/p>\n

But Spygenius take the song to another level, with a multilayered arrangement that suggests how The Beatles might have tackled it had they cut it for Abbey Road<\/em>. It soars, it dives, it swings. Brilliant.<\/p>\n

Andi n a word, brilliant is the best way to describe Spygenius\u2019 work overall. This 13-song collection shines a light on their strengths (save songwriting), and that\u2019s enough. That said, I for one am ready for another album of original music from the group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When a group \u2013 especially one with a proven track record of releasing high quality original material \u2013 appears with an album full of covers, it\u2019s fair to wonder. Have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22324,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[49,62,65],"tags":[4255],"class_list":["post-22323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-new-release","category-rawk","category-review","tag-spygenius","cat-49-id","cat-62-id","cat-65-id","has_thumb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22325,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22323\/revisions\/22325"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blog.musoscribe.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}