Under Cover April 2015 – Vic Chesnutt and Bonnie Prince Billie
When we were planning out the various themes that we wanted to include on The Nomad Series we decided at a very early stage that we wanted one of the albums to be made up of cover songs. We knew that we wanted there to be a theme that held the album together but were stumped as to what that theme would be….and then, on Christmas day, Vic died and our direction became obvious. The Demons album, (Volume 2 of The Nomad Series) was dedicated completely to Vic Chesnutt's songs. We recorded over 15 of Vic's songs and used only 11 on the album, one of the songs that we left off was "Marathon", which is now available here through the Under Cover Series. It is a harrowing song, set at a funeral reception, a song about the bitter battle that is life. I love this version, with Margo and Andy Maize sharing the lead vocal. "In training to run a marathon / miles and miles and mles / with your Sunday shoes on".
Bonnie Prince Billy is a truly unique voice on the contemporary music scene. He kind of sits outside of it and does what he wants to do, makes the sort of music that he is inspired to make. As a result he has written some truley idiosyncratic songs that take the listener on journeys that they may not want to go on, but are more often than not enlightening and inspiring. Here is a version of his song "I See A Darkness" recorded by Skydiggers during the "Angels" session, with Pete Cash on lead vocal.
You can dowload Marathon and I See A Darkness for free until May 15th off of the Latent facebook page.