Songbook #19: Sweet Jane
Sweet Jane, Sweet Jane
Oh Sweet, Sweet Jane
The Velvet Underground, covered by many, including the Cowboy Junkies
Sweet Jane
The Velvet Underground are known as one of the most influential rock & roll bands of all time. A poorly attributed quote says that "The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band." Naturally, their songs have been covered many times by many people, but to my mind the best one of those covers is the Cowboy Junkies version of Sweet Jane.
That cover comes off The Trinity Session, a deliberately low-fi album recorded in almost a single day around a single microphone at The Church of the Holy Trinity. This was the album that launched The Cowboy Junkies to a larger audience, in large part because their cover of Sweet Jane was included on the soundtrack to the movie Natural Born Killers. Lou Reed himself was reputed to have said that this stripped down acoustic version was the best version of Sweet Jane he'd ever heard.
But hey, you could have found all that out on the internet in five minutes. To me, this song is the very rare occasion that a coworker turned me on to a band. My then colleague TD lent it to me the album one day, saying that he figured I would appreciate it more than anybody else there. This led me through that album, and then several other albums, and then led me to seeing the Cowboy Junkies at the Kent Stage for my personal 2006 concert of the year.
Sweet Jane is by far the most memorable track on the album. It rocks despite having a very stripped down sound. It's a massive earbug. It's in my head. And I'm ok with that.
Tracklist
#1 - Welcome to the Jungle
#2 - Runnin' Blue
#3 - Cryin'
#4 - Mr. Jones
#5 - Blinded by the Light
#6 - Piano Man
#7 - Romeo & Juliet
#8 - Ecstasy
#9 - Seasons of Love
#10 - Red Sweater!
#11 - Insomniac
#12 - It Had to Be You
#13 - Cabaret
#14 - Psycho Killer
#15 - All Along the Watchtower
#16 - When I'm Up
#17 - Alcohol & Pills
#18 - What Becomes Of The Brokenhearted
#19 - Sweet Jane
Oh Sweet, Sweet Jane
The Velvet Underground, covered by many, including the Cowboy Junkies
Sweet Jane
The Velvet Underground are known as one of the most influential rock & roll bands of all time. A poorly attributed quote says that "The first Velvet Underground album only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band." Naturally, their songs have been covered many times by many people, but to my mind the best one of those covers is the Cowboy Junkies version of Sweet Jane.
That cover comes off The Trinity Session, a deliberately low-fi album recorded in almost a single day around a single microphone at The Church of the Holy Trinity. This was the album that launched The Cowboy Junkies to a larger audience, in large part because their cover of Sweet Jane was included on the soundtrack to the movie Natural Born Killers. Lou Reed himself was reputed to have said that this stripped down acoustic version was the best version of Sweet Jane he'd ever heard.
But hey, you could have found all that out on the internet in five minutes. To me, this song is the very rare occasion that a coworker turned me on to a band. My then colleague TD lent it to me the album one day, saying that he figured I would appreciate it more than anybody else there. This led me through that album, and then several other albums, and then led me to seeing the Cowboy Junkies at the Kent Stage for my personal 2006 concert of the year.
Sweet Jane is by far the most memorable track on the album. It rocks despite having a very stripped down sound. It's a massive earbug. It's in my head. And I'm ok with that.
Tracklist
#1 - Welcome to the Jungle
#2 - Runnin' Blue
#3 - Cryin'
#4 - Mr. Jones
#5 - Blinded by the Light
#6 - Piano Man
#7 - Romeo & Juliet
#8 - Ecstasy
#9 - Seasons of Love
#10 - Red Sweater!
#11 - Insomniac
#12 - It Had to Be You
#13 - Cabaret
#14 - Psycho Killer
#15 - All Along the Watchtower
#16 - When I'm Up
#17 - Alcohol & Pills
#18 - What Becomes Of The Brokenhearted
#19 - Sweet Jane