I don't know how many of you care as deeply about Badly Drawn Boy's Mercury Prize-winning 2000 debut album The Hour Of Bewilderbeast as I do, but today is a great day for anyone in that club. Fresh off the release of their self-titled debut LP, the Manchester post-rock trio Shaking Hand have covered "The Shining," the gorgeous folk-pop track that opens up Bewilderbeast like a sunrise.
Shaking Hand conjured the spirit of the original "The Shining" while putting their own twist on it. There's no French horn in this version of the song, and singer-guitarist George Hunter does fascinating things with Damon Gough's vocal melody on the chorus. It's extremely cool, and according to a press release, not only did Gough himself give it his stamp of approval, all three band members' fathers cried upon hearing it.
Hunter shares some context:
Badly Drawn Boy is an important artist for me and Fred as he frequently soundtracked a lot of our younger lives, long car journeys in particular. The Hour of Bewilderbeast is an album I still come back to and has probably had the most longevity in our lives so I've always wanted to cover a song from this album. We didn't just want to cover that was just a re hash of the original and with the Shining we could instantly put our own spin on by changing the instrumentation. It's nice to play a song from an era of Manchester music that can sometimes feel overlooked because the music wasn't all maracas and bucket hats.
Listen below.
Do "Once Around The Block" next!
