It’s always Falling And Laughing with these celebrity Orange Juice fans isn’t it? Kier Stammer being the OJ fan du jour. Well, yes, it’s a magnificent tune but there’s better. Dying Day is possibly my favourite and I think it was slated to be a single but that never came to pass. We’re doing singles so I’ll go with this Al Green cover. In and of itself it’s the standard 80s white boys covering a soul classic but for me it was a gateway to the wonderful world of The Reverend Al and Willie Mitchell. Weird to think such a classic pop group could be a way into Soul and also The Velvet Underground but there you go, that’s how it happened.
There were four albums I listened more than any others during my formative years, Crocodiles, Kilimanjaro, High Land Hard Rain and You Can’t Hide Your Love Forever. I still play them all regularly. You Can’t Hide Your Love Forever is the cheeriest of the bunch and always puts me in a good mood.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p06bqh3t This is supposed to be good. I can’t listen to it over here.
https://podtail.com/podcast/rock-s-backpages/e132-steven-daly-on-orange-juice-suede-sugar-hill-/ This has some suprising info on the recording of L.O.V.E. Love and Orange Juice in general. Turns out the producer was using the OJ album as a showcase for his skills, he wanted a track with horns on and persuaded Edwyn to record the Al Green song. Daily hates it, didn’t want to play on it and felt Belle was a much better Al Green tune to cover. Made me smile as that’s my favourite Al Green tune.
Anyway, L.OV.E. Love Orange Juice, the tune before the tune before they got somewhat big, not loved by all of the band but loved by me and, ultimately, the song that lead to me and the Mrs been possibly the only two people in the Beacon Theatre unaware that Al no longer (at the time) sang secular songs, but boy, could he make The Old Rugged Cross his own.
And that producer, Kidron, I think is his name, major chancer involved in some multimillion dollar scandal years later.