Whereas the first volume of ‘Heavy Hitters’ featured a mix of various guest vocalists, this time around Lynch and Pilson have brought in one of the best vocalists in the business, the longtime Stones backing vocalist Bernard Fowler. Powerhouse drummer Brian Tichy, also takes to the stool making this a rather great little ‘supergroup’. As a result this is a far more enjoyable album as a whole, with Fowler’s wonderful vocals bringing a consistent sound to the diverse selection of covers that run the gamut from some earthshaking Blues – maybe even the best Rock cover of ‘Smokestack Lightning’ I’ve heard; to the closing ‘Christmas’ song ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’…
The thing about covers albums is that they have most impact when you are familiar with the originals, at the same time it’s pretty wonderful when you hear something left field or unknown that really grabs you. The worst thing that can happen of course is a bad cover or selection. ‘Heavy Hitters II’ fares quite well in that respect with some cool selections and a mix of standards and the more obscure.
Opening with a bass heavy fuzzed up electric guitar version of Peter Gabriel’s ‘Sledgehammer’ some will love, it’s a song that has it all and introduces Fowlers’ wonderful vocals, so whilst I love what they’ve done with it, it was never a song back in the day that I really enjoyed. Even 37 years later I’ll still pass. And that I guess is the covers album in a nutshell – some songs you love others, not so much.
‘Carry On’ is much better, the classic CSNY folk anthem is given a wonderful Rocking sheen that really works. And whilst ‘The Stroke; is just one of those songs you cant really top, this gets incredibly close. To be honest though I could do without Imagine Dragons ‘Radioactive’ as even a rocked out version of an average song can only ever be average. Thankfully for every puff of smoke there’s a real gen and Corey Glover adds a guest vocal to ‘Smokestack Lightning’ that here is maybe even the best cover of that song I’ve ever heard. It’s a gem of a song!
‘Stay With Me’ on the other hand is one of the reasons I can’t listen to modern radio – it’s full of shit like this – they seem to have stopped writing great Soul in the early 80’s and all that ‘artists’ like Smith do with their co-writers is rehash and repackage classic sounds to produce the squeezy cheese version of music that used to have REAL soul. These days of course celebrity hacks like Smith have to rely on daft clothes more than the songs written for them. This one unbelievably was co-written with Jeff Lynne and Tom Petty but there’s not an ounce of their class in the song and even the Hard Rocking treatment can’t save it.
Interestingly for 80’s songs there’s a few here I never cared for in this collection and so forgive me if my years of avoiding dross like Tears For Fears are still showing now. I never liked ‘Shout’ that was of course played to death back in the day and 38 year slater I still don’t like it. You can’t as they say ‘polish a turd’ and sadly there are a few on here.
Thankfully the album then roars back to life with three classics back to back. First INXS’s ‘New Sensation’ gets the treatment and sounds absolutely wonderful as does the evergreen ‘Jumpin’ Jack Flash; which nicely rounds out The Stones connection. I think though that it’s Sly & The Family Stone’s that is my favourite of everything here and Pilson sounds like he’s having a ball especially. It’s such a great song and really done justice here.
We strangely close with the Christmas song ‘It’s A Wonderful Life’ now I love the movie of course and this sounds great … in August, even beating the Christmas stuff to the shelves just. (In reality it was released last year as a Christmas single and is just tacked on here for fun).
TRACKLISTING: 01. Sledgehammer | 02. Carry On | 03. The Stroke | 04. Radioactive | 05. Smokestack Lightning | 06. Hold On (I’m Coming) | 07. Stay With Me | 08. Shout | 09. New Sensation | 10. Jumpin’ Jack Flash | 11. Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) | 12. It’s A Wonderful Life