Hi, folks. Sorry about the lack of Stagger Lee over the weekend -- I had a family daytrip to go on, and forgot to prepare a post ahead of time. Why? Well, I was working on this:It's October, and people all over the world will be listening to "I'll Put A Spell On You" in a few weeks. Last year, I put up a total of 19 versions of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' classic voodoo howl. I just reupped the zip, and you can find Volumes One and Two here. Now, here are ten more versions of the song.
As Volume Two was mostly concerned with late-60's garage versions of the song, Volume Three is predominantly bluesy, and at some points even really mellow. (I particularly recommend Robben Ford's lovely, quiet instrumental version.)
My original, disastrous attempt to put together a collection involved weeding out all the artists we'd heard from already in the previous collections, and I found that a lot of the other versions I have... aren't fantastic. (I'm looking at you, Diamanda Galas!) So we're hearing a remix of the Sonique version we heard in Volume One, and the Woodstock recording from Creedence, whose version I put up in Volume Two. We've also got a live version from Gov't Mule, and a menacing 1980 rerecording from Screamin' Jay himself, with one K. Richards on guitar (via How Marvellous -- thanks!).
Mr. Richards' friend Bill Wyman is here too, as Beverley Skeete takes the Simone-ish vocal duties for his Rhythm Kings. You'll also hear from Tab Benoit, Jimmy Barnes, Leslie West, and The Black Elevators (with a version which I think frequent commenter CD emailed me last year).
I have about seven more versions of the song, but as I mentioned some aren't great, so you'll have to wait till next October for another collection. I've zipped them all up, and I'd recommend that, but you can cherry pick too if you like.
