Tracy Chapman

Ken sings it

I bet they could've made Allan sing it

Maybe when they are driving the car?

That must have been what got my wires crossed, yeah...

"Fast Car" might have actually made more sense than "Closer to Fine" as a driving away song but it's too much of a bummer

(xposts) That's good--honestly, my engagement with Spotify is minimal. I'm thinking more in terms of radio, and, again, going by the dogged persistance of many bad cover versions I could name.

There's also an L.A. car chase iirc

and speaking of "dogged persistence"

Closer to Fast Car

Try That In A Fast Car

It also kind of totally defeats the point I was making – in that "Fast Car" was a much bigger hit than "Closer to Fine." So I suppose what actually made that song "work so well" was that it's one folks of a certain age will recognize, but doesn't otherwise have a big cultural presence (whereas the Combs cover of "Fast Car" was released around the same time as the movie). Same with the Matchbox 20 song... such great choices for the way they were used, IMO

Fast Car has like seven verses? Nine? I lose track.

Just checked, it's probably six or seven, depending how you count. Verse 4 is a half-verse and verse 7 is a repeat of verse 4. I think. But feel free to correct me if I have it wrong.

So Europeans took a crack at this already

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnspjM3RG4Q

you just might not hear Tracy Chapman singing "Fast Car" anymore.

― clemenza, Monday, February 5, 2024 1:40 PM (forty-three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

i just hard her singing fast caar at the grammys yesterday

The Jonas Blue version peaked at number two on the UK Singles Chart, behind Zayn Malik's "Pillowtalk".[66] Its UK peak meant it charted higher than Chapman's original

Are you guys okay?

i remember exactly where i was when i heard the jonas blue version, it was a windowless gym which was lucky because i would have hurled something through some plate glass right then if i could have

My dogged persistence.

I assume the number of streams on Spotify is the number beside the song's running time when you look up that page?

https://i.postimg.cc/mgVsnrwk/percy.jpg

If so, Percy Sledge's original has 202,187,066 streams.
Michael Bolton's cover: 202,477,576--almost dead even, but more for the cover.
Harold Melvin's "If You Don't Know Me by Now": 64,745,809.
Simply Red's cover: 252,963,471--four times as many.

I don't know if I'm reading those numbers right, or what time-frame they refer to. And maybe those aren't good analogies for Tracy Chapman/Luke Combs. But over time, these things do not necessarily turn out like they should.

How “should” they turn out?

It’s pretty much a given fact of music consumption that the original version of a piece of music is not necessarily the definitive version. In fact, I’d argue that there’s no pint in worrying about the definitive version of a song, particularly one like “Fast Car” which seems to my ears to be constructed in an easily-digestible manner that almost invites other musicians to take their own stab at it.

You also can't test how much the covers may have "lifted up" the originals, by drawing attn (for some listeners) that they may not have otherwise received...

(xpost) I think that's true with some songs, but I absolutely think that some originals are definitive, and I don't want them to fade over time and be relaplaced by an inferior cover. And I definitely include "Fast Car" in that category.

apologies if this was already noted, but as of this morning the Chapman version was the number 1 streamed track on iTunes

Ah good, things are turning out like they should now

jonas blue's version of "fast car" has 1.1 billion (with a "b") streams

I have given "origninal" a partner with "relaplaced"...I think I need to switch to voice text or something.

That was mentioned earlier, and again, that's good to hear. Guess I'm thinking more years from now. Anyway, I don't like the cover, and that was really all I came on here to say.

It would have been funny if Jonas Blue had rushed the Grammy stage with a glow stick.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkl_Vq1SWKg

Only version I'm playing^

"Fast Car" was a popular song and it still is.

clemenza, I’m not cuckoo-for-cocoa-puffs over the cover either but I’m happy it’s not a) blatantly offensive, and b) done by someone determined to give Tracy Chapman all the shine she deserves for writing the song

"sometimes i rhyme slow" is great

Now that, I loved.

hell yeah

i was on 125 and st. nick

I got a plan
to get us outta this thread

But what often happens in terms of radio in these cases is the origninal disappears in favor of the cover--ask Harold Melvin or Percy Sledge. (Actually, you can't.) She'll get the royalties, you just might not hear Tracy Chapman singing "Fast Car" anymore.

How often was this 35 year old song getting played on the radio (and where) to start with?!

It was like Norah Jones’s “Don’t Know Why” at the time, in heavy rotation, and never fully left CVS playlists. Outlasted “Luka.”

Yeah, the places that do play it are ones that play folky stuff or 80s music and they aren’t going to swap it out for a Country cover.

a note-perfect country cover even

I still heard "Fast Car" a fair amount even before the Combs cover — on '80s oldies stations, or Jack FM stations, it's never really gone out of circulation I don't think.

I find the Combs cover stupendous, I'm slightly embarrased to say brought tears to my eyes when it randomly popped up as I was listening to the NPR 2023 playlist, still can't quite put my finger on why it works so well, but alpine static described it well:

deference, i think, is the word you're looking for. he just plays it as best he can w/o doing all sorts of shit to "make it his own" because, assuming we believe him, he just loves the song and it makes him think of his dad.

this is why it's good.

― alpine static, 31. december 2023 00:06 (one month ago)

well, also because Tracy Chapman wrote an incredible song

― alpine static, 31. december 2023 05:22 (one month ago)

I had not heard "give me one reason" prior to the fast car revival, so that's been a pleasant surprise

One of the reasons I am inclined to think fondly of Combs’ decision to cover it is that “Fast Car” is such a non-judgmental and anti-self-aggrandising song - this is where it derives a lot of its power, the absence of judgment makes piercing observations like “says his body’s too old for working / his body’s too young to look like his” that much more crushing.

If you don’t feel an immense amount of humility in covering this finely wrought, hand drawn map of human frailty, then you probably wouldn’t even have liked the song in the first place.

One of the things I love about this song (in either version) is how well it demonstrates how emotional restraint can imply its opposite. “Says his body’s too old for working / but his body’s too young to be looking like his” - not judgmental but crushing in its observation. Hi

lol at me trying to write long posts on my phone

the best "fast car" cover is jim o'rourke's 20 minute one

oh wait it's 30 minutes

not a very fast car then huh

Love those alpine static posts from December. I also believe that many of today's popular male country artists would have felt uncomfortable singing the "checkout girl" line as written.

Never got into Xiu Xiu's cover.

The Jim O'Rourke one feels like one of those "30 minutes of Billy Joel saying 'JFK Blown away'" Youtube videos.

Xiu Xiu’s cover works well in context

O’Rourke’s cover sucks but I would enjoy to hear Tracy work her way into that version

O’Rourke’s cover is sublime