One Song in the Style of A Nutter

I’ve been longing to play some Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and here’s my chance. (It may also enable me to sashay stylishly into a series of posts entitled “R U Bonkers??”, a sideways look at the world of insanity, which I’m thinking of doing.) Screamin’ Jay was possessed of a terrific voice and a total lack of any sense of boundaries. He should have been more celebrated than he was. His most famous song is the typically voodoo-themed I Put A Spell On You, made famous – in surely one of the best cover versions of anything ever - by Nina Simone*. But here's Jay himself - in what appears to be the USA version of Jazz Club (nice!) - doing a cover of that white-man’s homage to the African-American, Ol’ Man River. He seems to be playing in the style of Les Dawson at the beginning - I'd like to think he's cocking a snook at the overly po-faced host, who introduced us to him earlier with the line "he jumped out of a coffin and into our hearts" - but wait until 1:42 minutes in before he really starts to nutter up:



* Unfortunately there seems to be no video available with the studio version of this song, but this live clip maybe indicates how the incomparable Nina made it her own.

Yet Another Song in the Style of Another

I reckon that almost everything sounds better if done in a punk style. But then I was a 15-year-old in 1977. (I suppose if I'd been 15 in 1877 then I'd want everthing played as a Viennese Waltz, wouldn't I). Sunderland's The Toy Dolls are experts at this sort of thing. For adrenaline junkies here's their version of Khachaturian's Sabre Dance. And here's their Livin the Vida Loca: I just love to hear Geordie coming out of Ricky Martin's gob, and let's face it what vida could be more loca than living in Sunderland and looking like this: