There are over 3 hours of extra material for this record, and unlike her prior records, this one has yet to get a dedicated b-sides album, perhaps because the material is a bit more diverse. There are 10 studio b-sides, totalling 41min — easily a full album’s worth. There are also 4 brief ‘Silly Songs’ (including a rendition of ‘This Old Man’ — I just can’t get away from ’90s artists singing Knick Knack Paddy Wack, can I?), 2 Chas & Dave covers, several live songs, countless remixes, and more. Naturally, these tracks haven’t been released in a straightforward manner. The Silly Songs, Chas & Dave covers, and four of the main songs were released as b-sides on the ‘Caught a Lite Sneeze’ and ‘Talula’ singles.
Three more of the main songs were released as b-sides to her next record, and appear on the A Piano: The Collection box set (‘Never Seen Blue’, ‘Beulah Land’, ‘Cooling’). Those songs (along with ‘Walk to Dublin (Sucker’s Reprise), which was released for the first time on A Piano’) weren’t mixed until the sessions for her next record, so they have a slightly different sound (but stylistically, they are clearly part of these sessions). An additional three songs were released for the first time on the album’s deluxe edition, alongside the tracks from the singles (sans ‘Samurai’, which has never been reissued for some reason).
On the whole, these songs feel a lot more relaxed than the main album — and also much more sparse, as the instrumentation budget all went towards the songs that made the record. ‘Sucker’ and its reprise in ‘Walk to Dublin’ are the only songs here to use harpsichord (and thus unsurprisingly have considerably more attitude than the other tracks here, which is consistent with her general use of the instrument). The rest of it is mostly naked piano/vocal takes, without any of the extra instrumentation that was all over the main album. Porter adds bass to a few tracks, but that’s about the extent of the arranging here.
‘Cooling’ is the clear highlight here — it’s the track that became a live staple (but puzzlingly excluding the best part of the song in her performances through 2009). She spoke about her relationship to the song (and b-sides in general) in the liner notes for A Piano: ‘B-sides used to very much be a big part of a release of a work. For me they were never an afterthought. There was a time when you would buy a commercial single before the release of the record, and B-sides would be included on these singles as bonus material. So in essence, besides the first single, the B-sides would be one of the first things you heard from the new record. Therefore, there was a lot of effort put into making these moments sparkle. With the change in how people get their music, B-sides have become a thing of the past. But some of them were my favorites.
“Cooling,” in retrospect, probably should have been on Boys for Pele, but I think maybe it was one of those things I wasn’t ready to put on an album. You can’t get away from the fact that when you put a song on an album it’s out there for everyone to judge and critique. There have been certain songs, and I can’t tell you why, that I just haven’t wanted to expose. Maybe it’s a little too close to the bone. But for whatever reason, you just feel as if you don’t want everybody making a comment on it.’ Despite her reticence to expose the song, it doesn’t exactly expose itself. The lyrics are cryptic, referencing some sort of situation in her life that she didn’t want to be too explicit about. It’s unclear to me how it would’ve fit in with the record, thematically.
Many of these b-sides are more clearly related to the main themes of the album. ‘To The Fair Motormaids of Japan’ features some very direct lyrics about her breakup with Rosse alongside some more typically reference-drenched and surreal stanzas. ‘Never Seen Blue’ also tackles this in a more straight-ahead fashion — perhaps these songs got cut because she felt they were a hair too obvious, though they are both quite good. The chorus melody of ‘Never Seen Blue’ calls back to the bridge of ‘Muhammed My Friend’ (the ‘never seen fire’ lyric).
‘Alamo’ is also quite strong, using the famous battle to talk about her last stand to save a failing relationship. It’s got a particularly notable piano intro. The remastered version that appears on the deluxe edition adds a bass line from George Porter, Jr. which was not present on the original single version, which was just piano and voice. The bass gives it a bit more groove and bounce, which doesn’t necessarily serve the emotion of the song, but I enjoy both versions. ‘Sister Named Desire’ covers similar territory, complete with bass accompaniment.
Other songs tackle themes that are outside the scope of the main album. ‘Beulah Land’ takes us back to the deep south and tackles religion in a way that feels just slightly off topic. ‘Frog on my Toe’ is a song about visiting her grandfather’s grave and singing to him. It’s not totally clear to me what the wacky ‘Walk to Dublin’ is about, featuring lines like ‘The lord, he needs the U.S. Marines’ but also ‘I said, I need size 10,000 for my ass, yes’. You can tell it was mixed in the sessions for her next record — the aesthetic just feels a bit different, particularly with regards to the drums. Many of these tracks feature studio commentary at the end, and some were probably improvised — for example, ‘Samurai’, which features her mumbling scratch lyrics. She states ‘We gotta cut that one, too’ at the end, and talks about reading lyrics directly out of a book.
As for the ‘Silly Songs’, ‘Graveyard’ stands out for not being particularly silly at all. It’s another song about singing at someone’s grave, though this time the subject is female — Marianne, perhaps? ‘Toodles Mr. Jim’ is a tale about a childhood neighbor of hers who had recently died — she punched his daughter in the nose after getting bullied by her, and Mr. Jim stood up for her instead of his daughter. It’s easy to read disturbing sexual implications into this track, but it appears this is not the case.
The covers this time around are of English working class pub anthems by Chas & Dave, which are amusing enough. Evidently she recorded these to win over her male crew, who had introduced her to the duo, as they were unused to working under a female producer. Ah, the 90s… She reinterpreted them from a female perspective: ‘I took it from the Marlene Dietrich standpoint. I was seeing the bombs drop on England and I just saw myself as this German cabaret dyke who kind of fell in love with these women who were running from these bombs that were being dropped. I didn’t have a political viewpoint in my mind. I wasn’t thinking about the Nazis, I was just thinking about the idea that these women had this fortitude, and how beautiful they were. I kinda just took on this personal of myself that’s like, y’know, a German dyke cabaret singer…. and I sang it from that perspective. And ‘That’s What I Like Mick,’ of course, I sang from the perspective of mouldy cheese.’
A Piano, the Collection — Discs 2–3 (2006)
Each successive record in this collection receives a bit less attention than the last. All of the songs from Little Earthquakes appear in some form in this box, plus 8 of the b-sides, and all but 3 songs from Under the Pink are present, plus 7 of the b-sides. Pele’s representation is a bit more scant — only 8 songs from the main album appear in some form here, but loads of b-side material from these sessions appear here instead. The Boys for Pele songs are mostly split between the end of disc 2 and the start of disc 3. These songs include several alternate versions — the ‘Dakota Version’ of ‘Hey Jupiter’, both the ‘Merry Widow Version’ and the ever-present ‘Armand’s Star Trunk Funkin’ Mix Radio Edit’ of ‘Professional Widow’, and an alternate mix of ‘Caught a Lite Sneeze’— plus the b-side ‘Walk to Dublin (Sucker Reprise)’. A remixed version of ‘Doughnut Song’ is oddly stuck on the very end of Disc 3, after the To Venus and Back material.
Unlike with her previous two albums, the sequencing of these tracks doesn’t form a cohesive alternate version of the record. Nonetheless, it’s interesting hearing ‘Horses’, ‘Father Lucifer’, and ‘Marianne’ in sequence, momentarily focusing in on the piano side of the record. The remix of ‘Doughnut Song’ is a bit wetter and brighter, while the ‘Caught a Lite Sneeze’ mix feels more dry and sharp. Neither feels particularly necessary — they’re not different enough from the originals for it to be noticeable without a direct side-by-side comparison.
The b-sides disc includes an additional 8 songs from these sessions, (including the three songs which appeared as b-sides to her next record, as mentioned above), and a b-side/demo played on a harmonium — an unreleased song called ‘Fire Eater’s Wife’ leading into a demo of ‘Beauty Queen’. Oddly enough, 3 of the 4 silly songs appear here instead of some of the more substantial b-sides. While the main album may not be particularly thoroughly represented, there’s still 20 tracks from the Boys for Pele era here, making the representation of these sessions about equivalent to Little Earthquakes. Regardless, the choice of tracks from these sessions is a bit strange.
Boys for Pele Deluxe Edition (2016)
The remastering job on this record makes it more spacious, bringing the vocals forwards in the mix. This isn’t really in the album’s favor — for one, the piano is a lot harder to hear in a car in this master. More importantly, it removes some of the album’s claustrophobia. That certainly doesn’t ruin the experience — not even close, as the album is strong enough that it works either way — but I can’t see any reason to listen to this over the original.
The sequencing on the Deluxe edition bonus disc is kind of a mess. Whoever sequenced it decided that the best approach would be to mix up all the different piles of songs here — the remixes and alternate versions, the live tracks from the singles, proper b-sides, silly songs, Chas & Dave covers, a demo.… Basically, no two songs from any one pile appear consecutively. I find this makes for a jarring listen at times, and would’ve preferred the songs to be more clearly organized into their respective piles.
In defense of this approach, however, this sequencing highlights the diversity of this pile of material, and it has grown on me a little bit (with the clear exception of that pesky ‘Professional Widow’ remix, which sledgehammers the flow everywhere it appears). I imagine she was trying to lighten the mood with some of the goofier material here, providing herself with a break from the exorcism. Regardless, the choices of what to include and exclude are head-scratching. Four songs were released for the first time here — ‘To The Fair Motormaids of Japan’, the only barely discernibly different ‘M&M mix’ of ‘Talula’, ‘Sucker’ (which is oddly placed AFTER its reprise), and the odd minute-long snippet ‘In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Rookery Ending)’.
Two of those new tracks are proper b-sides that were finally released here for the first time, and they’re very solid tracks which are among the best on offer here, as I discussed above. On the other hand, there are four proper b-sides they chose to exclude here, including ‘Samurai’, which is only available on an old single at this point, and ‘Cooling’, the best b-side from these sessions. This disc is filled to the brim with a runtime over 79min, but they could’ve found better ways to fill it. Who felt that the remixes, live versions of b-sides from prior albums, and silly covers were somehow more important to include than those tracks?
If the idea was to exclude the songs that were mixed in the Choirgirl sessions, then why is ‘Walk to Dublin (Sucker Reprise)’ present? On that note, there are major mastering errors on ‘Walk To Dublin’, making the track sound tinny, distorted, and thin. All of that just adds up to make this release feel a little bit lazy. I would’ve hoped that a bit more care would’ve been given to this release after the mastering errors on the Under the Pink remaster, but no!
Hey Jupiter EP (1996)
The ‘Hey Jupiter’ EP features a remix (evidently really a re-recording) of its title track and 4 live songs . The ‘Hey Jupiter (Dakota Version)’ replaces the piano accompaniment of the album version with a slowed down version of the drum loop from the end of the Little Earthquakes b-side ‘Sugar’, plus a full band arrangement. It omits the third verse but extends the song in other ways. It’s an interesting and enjoyable take on the song, though I ultimately feel like the album version works better.
The live tracks are the real substance of this EP — there are live versions of ‘Sugar’ and ‘Honey’ (b-sides from the previous two albums), an abbreviated ‘Merry Widow Version’ of ‘Professional Widow’ sung over slow organ accompaniment, and a rendition of ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’. It’s cool to hear ‘Sugar’ in stripped down piano/vocal form, complete with a fun origin story at the start, but I don’t prefer it to the vibier studio version. ‘Honey’ sticks pretty close to the original. The ‘Merry Widow Version’ is the real highlight here, somehow making the song even darker than it already was, giving it an ominous church mass feeling. Her performance is extremely intense — it’s just awesome.
Remixes / Singles
The singles for Professional Widow, In the Springtime of His Voodoo, and Talula featured over 90min of remixes of those 3 songs. I already discussed the ‘Talula (Tornado Mix)’ in the review of the main album. BT’s ‘Synethasia Mix’ of ‘Talula’ is the best of the remaining mixes. It’s not really a remix of the album version of ‘Talula’ at all — it only samples the vocal from the new intro of the ‘Tornado Mix’. Nonetheless, it’s got more detailed and interesting production than the other mixes here, and while I’m not exactly going to give it a high recommendation (it really doesn’t need to be 11.5min long), it’s enjoyable if you’re into that sort of thing.
The bulk of the remixes are for ‘Professional Widow’ — there are 9 versions, totalling over 50min, and they are all pretty much redundant with each other and torturous to endure (though I will concede that this sort of club dance music is rarely my thing). The radio edit of ‘Armand’s Star Trunk Funkin’ Mix’ was successful in Europe, and thus appeared on a zillion releases — the ‘Hey Jupiter’ and ‘Professional Widow’ singles, the bonus disc on the deluxe reissue of the main album, the ‘Tales of a Librarian’ compilation, and the ‘A Piano: The Collection’ box set. It even appears in the sequence of the main album right after the original song in the UK reissue, kicking ‘In the Springtime of His Voodoo’ off the record to make room — an especially puzzling decision.
This is one of those dance remixes that’s just a standard dance beat, a new bass line, and vocal samples of two lines from the song (‘Honey, bring it close to my lips, yeah’ and ‘It’s gotta be big (hussy)’) repeated ad infinitum. Not only is it bad, but it also feels ragingly out of place with all of the over material on all of those releases, making its placement everywhere rather frustrating. The other remixes of this song are mostly variations on the Armand mix. Seeing as this mix gets old before the 4 minutes of the radio edit are up, listening to 7 variations on it which are largely in the 7–8min range is not thrilling.
The best of these mixes is the ‘MK Mix’, which has a lot more going on musically than the Armand mixes and uses a different part of the vocal. It’s still not amazing — I think it mostly stands out due to contrast — but at least it switches things up. A second version of this mix, the ‘MK Vampire Dub’, features some rather irritating vocal editing and loses the appeal of the original, but at least it still provides a break from the onslaught of Armand.
Finally, there are 4 remixes of ‘In the Springtime of His Voodoo’, which are only marginally better than the ‘Professional Widow’ remixes. While the Armand mixes are just bland and lifeless, these have a particularly kitschy and dated sound, particularly in the piano sample. All four remixes are variations on the Hasbrouck Heights mix. The full 10min mix is the most appealing of these, particularly in its first half — it’s at least got a real trajectory and journey to it. The ‘Sugar Dub’ starts with a sample of the speech from the live version of ‘Sugar’ on the Hey Jupiter EP, and also features a prominent piano solo and uses very little of the ‘Voodoo’ vocal take (most of it is instrumental).
Other Covers from the Era
She performed a cover of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Landslide’ for the first volume of Sonic Sessions. It’s basically exactly what you’d expect from her covering this song live in piano/vocal form, and she delivers it with a lot of nuance. It’s a solid cover! She also covered Bruce Springsteen’s ‘I’m On Fire’ for VH1 Crossroads. It’s again pretty much what you’d expect, with another excellent performance. I don’t find it as compelling as the Fleetwood Mac cover, but I also find the original song less compelling.
-
Here is the track order I settled on for a more organized b-sides collection:
Disc 1
To the Fair Motormaids of Japan
Samurai
Frog on My Toe
Sister Named Desire
Alamo
Sucker
Never Seen Blue
Beulah Land
Cooling
Walk to Dublin (Sucker’s Reprise)
Silly Songs
This Old Man
Hungarian Wedding Songs
Graveyard
Toodles Mr. Jim
Chas & Dave Covers
London Girls
That’s What I Like Mick (The Sandwich Song)
Bonus Extras
Talula (M&M Mix)
In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Rookery Ending)
Putting the Damage On (Twilight Mix)
Fire Eater’s Wife / Beauty Queen (Demo)
Disc 2
Hey Jupiter EP + Additional Live Songs
Hey Jupiter (The Dakota Version)
Sugar (Live)
Honey (Live)
Professional Widow (Merry Widow Version — Live)
Somewhere Over the Rainbow (Live Cover)
Amazing Grace / Til The Chicken (Live Cover)
Landslide (Fleetwood Mac Cover) (Sonic Session, January 31st 1996)
I’m On Fire (Bruce Springsteen Cover) (VH1 Crossroads)
Talula Single
Talula (The Tornado Mix)
Talula (BT’s Synethasia Mix)
Disc 3 — Dance Remixes
Professional Widow Singles
Professional Widow (Armand’s Star Trunk Funkin’ Mix — Radio Edit)
Professional Widow (Mr. Roy’s 7" Edit)
Professional Widow (Armand’s Star Trunk Funkin’ Mix)
Professional Widow (Mr. Roy’s Cosmic Cottage Mix)
Professional Widow (Just Da Funk Dub)
Professional Widow (MK Mix)
Professional Widow (MK Vampire Dub)
Professional Widow (Armand’s Instrumental)
Professional Widow (Bonus Beats)
In the Springtime of His Voodoo Single
In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Hasbrouck Heights Single Mix)
In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Hasbrouck Heights Club Mix)
In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Quiet Mix)
In the Springtime of His Voodoo (Sugar Dub)
