The Dark End of Cat Power's Street

I thought it’d be kind of cool tonight to lay some new Cat Power on you. Her latest, an EP titled Dark End of the Street, will be out next Tuesday.

The disk is composed of cover songs recorded for Jukebox but not released on that album. As on the previous full-length album, Cat Power turns each song into something totally her own. At times so much so it’s hard to even refer to these disks as “cover” albums. For instance, if you could take CCR’s swamp sound further and make it a midnight walk through that swamp by yourself, Chan Marshall does it with her version of “Fortunate Son.”

Alongside “Fortunate Son,” Chan takes five other tracks – by artists as diverse as the Pogues and Otis Redding – to the dark end of her street making a transformation Rolling Stone calls “an emotive indie rocker [turning] into a bona fide soul singer.” The title track, a classic cheatin’ song recorded by, among others, Aretha Franklin and The Allman Brothers, is just one instance of how beautifully Chan’s voice adapts to this soulful and bluesy music.

Matador Records will issue Dark End of the Street December 9 digitally and as a deluxe double-gatefold 10-inch vinyl EP. If you visit their site, you can not only order Cat Power’s album, but you can download a free 13-track sampler of other upcoming releases. Do it!

Dark End of the Street.mp3

Labels: covers, soul

posted by aikin @ 9:04 PM