Having received some slightly tart remarks about the five month gap between the two previous posts in the series, I am trying to do a bit better. This one arrives a mere six weeks after the last one.
I have always thought of today's song as a Motown standard, but it turns out that it was surprisingly unsuccessful when first released. The Four Top's version of "Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" only reached No. 45 in the US and No. 21 in the UK when it came out in 1966, thus making Nick Kamen's 1987 effort - No. 16 in the UK - technically the most successful version.
Any song has an immediate advantage when its sung by Levi Stubbs, and the original is still my favourite. But you can say the same for any song sung by Frankie Miller so I have put his 1976 single next. He runs them a pretty close second.
After that we have smorgasbord of sounds from 1968/69: some soul from Chuck Jackson, something a bit folkier from Dion, and then South African pop sensations The Square Set who had a local No. 1 with a cover of "Silence Is Golden" so are probably covering The Tremeloes' cover which came out in 1967.
Moving forward to the early 1970s we have some supper club soul from Leslie Uggams before handing over to The Band and Bryan Ferry to give the song a bit of welly.
We finish off with a surprisingly good French version from 1967 from the man who co-wrote "My Way" and sang "Tears On The Telephone" and, of course, with the MRV. For the first time in this series we welcome the great Mr Delroy Wilson.
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - The Four Tops
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Frankie Miller
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Chuck Jackson
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Dion
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - The Square Set
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Leslie Uggams
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever (live)" - The Band
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Bryan Ferry
"N'est-ce Pas Etrange?" - Claude François
"Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" - Delroy Wilson
No comments:
Post a Comment