Unusual song covers.

Once upon a time I had mixed feelings about an artist covering the songs of another artist. I can't actually remember why I felt that way but I got over it a long time ago. It is, of course, the staple diet of the very many talent contests on TV but that has hardly encouraged me. On the other hand my most recent post mentioned only covered songs and that I suppose made has made me think about the subject yet again. That is in a sense driven by the fact that Ryan Adams' cover of Taylor Swift's '1989' in toto actually didn't spark that response because I have worked through my thoughts on that territory before.
This is one by an artist, Natalie Prass, that I saw live this summer, and mentioned, with a song I might not have imagined her taking on. Let's see how this turns out.  She is covering a song in an entirely different genre to her own and one that was first released in the year she was born.

Here she covers Slayer and 'Raining Blood' from the 1986 album 'Reign In Blood'.

You may like neither version one little bit but I contend that it was an interesting, and even braver, choice.

Green Man - Dyn Gwyrdd 2015 - Part 3 - The Mountain Stage

The Mountain Stage, the main one at Green Man Festival, has a strong claim to being as perfectly situated as any at a UK festival. When The Garden Stage was the main one at End Of The Road Festival, before the addition of The Woods Stage in 2012, then that was probably the one but the Mountain Stage is far bigger and its situation in an amphitheatre, the result of a long vanished country house garden and with views of the mountains (weather permitting) as a backdrop seals it. 
On early Sunday evening, with a low sun illuminating the stage, it was pretty amazing.

Jessica Staveley-Taylor of The Staves, Mountain Stage, Sunday evening.

The sun was an even rarer commodity on Saturday but during the couple of hours when it graced us with its presence one of the beneficiaries was the awesome Marika Hackman performing completely solo.

Without any doubt this set was one of the highlights of the weekend.

Indeed, Saturday afternoon on the mountain stage was on good form generally. She was followed by the always heart-warming, and every-time-better-than-the last The Leisure Society.

While, despite the release of five LPs, still not really well known in the UK Australian Darren Hanlon deserves to be more so. This was the first time I had seen him play live and it was time well spent. Songs based on observations of detail and a very special way with words.

A bonus of going to multiple festivals is that, when they share the same acts it is possible to ameliorate the situation as regards clashes somewhat. Natalie Prass, from Richmond VA, also appears this coming weekend at End Of The Road 2015.

 The other possibility, and it happened to me a couple of times last summer, is that one simply decides to see them twice!