Not Quite A Copycat: The Uncanny Musical Valley Written by Ewan Spence on April 15, 2014 | 4 Comments

We’re not here to point out songs that sound exactly the same; think of this series of articles as a gateway to new performers and music to explore.

Using the music of the 2014 Song Contest as a springboard, what tracks are just a single step to the side of this year’s three minute wonders? Following on from Sam’s selection of songs and artists inspired by the 2014 performers, it’s the turn of ESC Insight’s Ewan Spence to flip through his box of vinyl to inspire a Eurovison-related playlist to start your week.

Nobody Does It Better

Just after the whole Pierce Brosnan / James Bond revival in 1995, composer David Arnold organised and produced ‘Shaken and Stirred‘, an album of cover versions of James Bond theme songs given a unique spin by each artist. There’s something hauntingly wonderful in my mind about Jarvis Cocker’s rendition of ‘All Time High‘ and Martin Fry’s ‘Thunderball‘.

You can probably see where this is going already, given that Austria’s Conchita Wurst has already said that ‘Rise Like A Phoenix‘ is her Bond theme. But there’s more to this inspiration than the Bond connection. David McAlmont’s rendition of ‘Diamonds are Forever‘ hits the high notes of both Phoenix and Shirley Bassey’s original. Throw in the video and the underlying message, and the progress that has been made in European attitudes in the last seventeen years is clear. There’s a long way to go, but this musical comparison allows a sociological comparison to be made, as well as being a damn fine slice of songsmanship.

Prep the Chandelier

There might not be an immediate comparison with Albania’s Hersi, but something in ‘One Night’s Anger‘ clicked with me and made the mental connection to New York’s Rachael Sage. A formidable businesswoman as well as a musician, she set up her own label as she started on her musical career (Mpress Records) to promote herself and a collection of indie artists she knew.

Now a favourite fixture on the music festival scene, Sage has eleven albums of material to explore, and there are some fantastic tracks. The sneaking suspicion that Hersi has a match in that mix meant I could spend a happy hour or so jumping around the discography before I confirmed the match my brain knew was there.

The match is ‘Vertigo‘, a colourful and wandering song, with shifting time signatures, flourishes, and sweeping lyrics. Take your love of ‘One Night’s Anger‘, spin it into ‘Vertigo‘, and then head out to explore the rest of Sage’s work.

Check This Hand ‘Cause I’m Marvellous

I’m a regular attendee of the SXSW music festival, and four years ago I stumbled over a young fiddle player at the very start of her career. Ruby Jane has blossomed into one of the most sought after fiddlers in Texas, and was invited by Lady Gaga to play with her on a rather southern version of ‘Bad Romance‘. That’s what I love about both the new music / unsigned scene and the Eurovision National Finals. It’s the chance to see and hear artists at various points of their career, and not necessarily when a major label shows interest.

While Dilara Kazimova has spent a few years trying to sing for Azerbaijan on the Song Contest stage, she has grown and matured since her time with rock band Unformal and Milk & Kisses at the turn of the century. I see the same sparks in her music and voice, the same promise in the package, and the same growth as she moved through Böyük Səhnə and to Copenhagen that I saw in Ruby Jane years ago.

Where Dilara has ‘Start a Fire’, Ruby has ‘Wake Up‘.

Mysterious Musical Power

Again, this isn’t a sound-alike, but a theme-a-like. Hailing out of mid-west America, Ezra Furman is a brooding and introspective character when you meet him, who sometimes struggles to express the ideas and intentions behind his music in an interview. Put him on stage with a microphone and a guitar though and it’s a different matter. He manages to mix singalong lyrics with some rather dark subject matter in tracks like ‘Teenage Wasteland‘, and ‘I Killed Myself But Didn’t Die‘.

I want to zero in on a track called ‘Blood Sucking Whore,’ a typically catchy Furman number which sits happily in dark territory. While the lyrics in ‘Whore‘ are not as dark as Andreas Kallay-Saunders ‘Running‘, the anger in the vocals of both Furman and Kallay-Saunders is there for all to hear. They both attack the material with the righteousness of youth, accompanied by driving beats laced with passion and pleading.

Again, we’re not calling these songs as being musically identical, but thematically similar. If you like one, try the other, and see what you think.

But I Want A Moustache…

Where to go here if we are looking for a comparison to Latvia’s impressive ‘Cake to Bake‘? I could go to the complicated guitar based traditional songs of Lincoln Durham; I could go for the tightly focused compositions of singer-songwriter of someone like Adam Arcuragi. There’s also an augment for the detailed lyrics of The Jamestown Revival. But given most fans have pegged this as the comedy track of the year, let’s stay in that space.

That means we have a rich vein to explore. From Mitch Benn’s ‘Eurovision Song‘ via BBC Radio 4 to the story based epics from Tripod (such as ‘Tripod vs. the Dragon: The Musical‘), there are many echoes of ‘Cake to Bake‘ on the comedy circuit. But I’m going to go with The Beards.

Formed in Australia in 2005, they’ve been known to the happily hirsute here in Europe since their 2013 tour, with a singular focus on the facial hair around the chin (Conchita, take note). Throw that ethos alongside an album of songs about beards (for example ‘You Should Consider Having Sex With a Bearded Man‘), and you have songwriting, comedy, and presentation, all at the same sort of level as Aarzemnieki. If I have to pick one track (and I do) I’ll look for their catchiest song with a message.

Ladies and gentlemen… ‘If Your Dad Doesn’t Have A Beard, You’ve Got Two Mums.’

..although I’m going to double back to Mitch Benn’s ‘Song For Europe’, just because it’s NSFW and gorgeous…

 Missing Presumed Having A Good Time

It’s too easy to pick out another Balkan Ballad to go with ‘Moj Svet‘ this year, so this is a Zeljko-free zone. Let me introduce you to Willie Nile, a proud singer-songwriter from Buffalo, NY. He burst on to the music scene in 1980, but two albums later, legal issues forced him out of the recording studios. It would be ten years before the third album appeared, and fifteen for the self-published ‘Beautiful Wreck of the World‘.

Album four arrived in 2006. ‘The Streets of New York‘ is a one-hour love letter to the great American city, reflecting the ghost and lows of the metropolis, the hopes and dreams of individuals, all woven into a tapestry that connects every song together, and in opinion is his finest work. Arguably ‘The Day I Saw Bo Diddley in Washington Square‘ is keystone that holds the album together, but I want to go a little deeper into the track list with the slower and more introspective ‘Faded Flower of Broadway‘, which has the same haunting quality and story-telling ability that Sergej Cetkovic brings to the Eurovision stage.

It’s also not easily available to embed here, so you’ll need to head to the digital stores to buy it. For the meantime, Nile’s ‘American Ride‘ should cover the bases, but there is more out there..

Zooey D and M Ward Up A Tree…

The formulaic male and female Country singers infused with a bit of will they/won’t they/have they is pretty much a staple of Nashville. It might feel fresh and new on the Eurovision stage, but look around and the classic pairing is everywhere. Which means if The Common Linnets has caught your imagination you are in for an amazing ride.

Where to start is probably the toughest challenge. You have the classic Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton. You have Vince Gill and pretty much any recording artist in Nashville – his works with Kelly Clarkson, Roseanne Cash, and Reba McEntire are worth looking out for (although his work on Bonnie Tyler’s ‘Rocks and Honey’ is probably best not mentioned). Then there are genuine husband-and-wife pairings such as Bruce Robison and Kelly Willis.

But if you want a pairing that works, that has tension, heartbreak, a mastery of music, and quite frankly some of the best stage performances in the world, you need to turn to The Civil Wars.

Joy Williams and John Paul White burned brightly. Intensely. And in spectacular style they burned out after one and a half albums, with their self-titled second album requiring some deft editing work to reach a full compliment. It worked, it was amazing, but the debut, ‘Barton Hollow‘ will probably go down as one of the finest albums of this decade.

Gone, but not forgotten, and discovered by more people every day, what appears to be their final track while on speaking terms opened up that second album. Dear Netherlands, this is how you do a country relationship on stage…

(Dammit, I still miss them).

We’ll have another ‘Not Quite A Copycat’ next week, but we’d love to hear your opinions as well. What connections have been sparked by this year’s Eurovision songs? Let us know in the comments.