Tuesday 1 March 2016

If I Should Fall Behind



A few weekends ago we were at good friends for dinner and inevitably after the food was finished and we were all sat in "the comfy chairs" the conversation turned to music and as J & I don't feel the need to have thoosands of cds or records cluttering up their home but do have a big fuck off "smert" (smart) telly,  we trawled through Youtube,  One shot each, choose a track and then pass on the remote. This  resulted in all sorts of strange stuff appearing on the screen. I have to admit that the first time I did this my mind went blank, thumbing through somebody's vinyl collection or scanning a shelf of cds, that's easy but confronted with the whole of the internet, well that is incredibly fucking difficult. Of course I ended up going for obvious things, Spanish Horses from the Paisley Abbey gig and By My Baby, very predictable. Anyway, when J took her second shot she said "this is my funeral song" and proceeded to play a rather excellent Springsteen video for a song, If I Should Fall Behind,  that I was aware of but up until that moment was not one of those that had had much resonance for me, unlike Point Blank, I'm Going Down, Jersey Girl or the dozens of others I love. But I have to admit at that moment, in that context, with the Airdrie match I had witnessed that day, the conversation, the company and I think probably the most significant factor, the amount of red wine consumed,  I was actually quite moved, The video finished, Lynn chose her next tune and the moment passed.

I didn't think that much about the song until last week when a track came on the iPod that was familiar but not quite right and after maybe half a minute I identified the song. "But this can't be right!" I thought, Springsteen wrote this song in the early 90s how can there be a doo wop version by Dion? But there is it was recorded in 2000 and included on the Deja Nu album,  it is absolutely glorious and it completely changes the mood of the song. I have decided that I need to revisit disc 3 of the King of The New York Streets to see if there are further gems that I have overlooked!

Dion - If I Should Fall Behind

and here is the Springsteen video for those of you not acquainted with it.



4 comments:

Charity Chic said...

Sounds like a good night Drew

The Swede said...

Bruce and the E-Street Band performed this version of the song as the final encore of the reformation gig I saw at Earls Court in 1999. Grown men cried.

George said...

That Dion song is great, nice one Drew.

Anonymous said...

Rose Cousins has a great version of the song in her "We have made a Spark" album