GROW BIGGER EARS #18: Scritti Politti Under Cover! Chaka Khan, Miles Davis, Al Jarreau
Covers are few for the synth-pop '80s group, Scritti Politti. But, it's not for a lack of melodic, hit-worthy tunes written mostly by Green Gartside and David Gamson. Let's go over the covers!
Lack of Cover
Not many artists have covered the music of Scritti Politti. Surprising, if you know their music, as it was catchy and melodic, with plenty of room for harmonies. In fact, had it not been for the great mascara embargo of 1985, Scritti Politti might have been able to out-Duran Duran, a band for whom “Maybelline” was so much more than just a Chuck Berry song.
Hits, if not for the band itself, might’ve been waiting for just the “right” adventurous artist to tackle. When I had the idea of creating a Scritti cover Playlist, I had originally thought some heavy trimming down would await me. Alas, it was all I could do to find this small handful, focusing mainly on the band’s two mid-’80s albums.
Scritti Politti was formed in 1977 in Leeds, England, by Welsh singer-songwriter, Green Gartside.
We eavesdrop on the band’s Wiki to discover their origin: “Beginning as a punk-inspired collective of art students and squatters, Scritti Politti released several early post-punk recordings on Rough Trade Records before transitioning into a mainstream pop music project in the early to mid-1980s, enjoying significant success in the record charts in the UK and the U.S.
“The group’s most successful album, 1985’s Cupid & Psyche 85, spawned three UK Top 20 hits with ‘Wood Beez (Pray Like Aretha Franklin)’ [featured on our Playlist], ‘Absolute’ and ‘The Word Girl,’ as well as a U.S. Top 20 hit with ‘Perfect Way’ [featured twice on our Playlist, one instrumentally].
“The band’s 1988 album, Provision, was a UK Top 10 success, though it only produced one UK Top 20 hit single, ‘Oh Patti’,” [featured on our Playlist].
It’s these two albums (and the songs therein) that are highlighted here; they’re the ones most covered (again, so few were), but they also form the zenith of the band’s (and Green’s) recorded output, in this writer’s opinion. Both albums were released by Virgin Records in the UK, and Warner Bros. in the U.S.
Shades of Green
Born Paul Julian Strohmeyer on June 22, 1955 in Cardiff, Wales, the “Gartside” name was handed to him by his stepfather. “Ever the outsider,” wrote Steve Pafford in 2020, and quoting Gartside: “The ‘Green’ bit came about because I didn’t like the fact there were two other Pauls in my class, and I wanted something different. So I just chose something random after listening to a Captain Beefheart album where all the musicians were named odd things like Zoot Horn Rollo.”
For the record (and occasional 8-track), Green probably doesn’t need reminding that other Beefheart band members were Drumbo, Antennae Jimmy Semens, Rockette Morton, and perhaps in a prescient peek to the androgynous ‘80s, The Mascara Snake. If Green indeed wanted “different,” he’d need look no further than the good Captain.
Green is the only band member to have remained throughout Scritti’s history.
Sometime in 1982, a Rough Trade exec introduced Green to New York keyboardist, programmer, engineer, and eventual songwriter, David Gamson. The two “G-men” hit it off, and discovered they had a lot in common, musically, particularly in the kind of music they wanted to create.
The following year, Gartside and Gamson met up with another New Yorker, drummer Fred Maher, to put together a new version of Scritti Politti. As Maher recalled in a 1985 interview with Smash Hits Magazine, “I'll never forget the first time I saw Green. It was in the studio in New York and he came up to me and said ‘Hello, I’m Green, I’m terrible.’ He’d been out the night before with [Soft Cell musician] Marc Almond and he looked a bit the worse for wear.”
The Great “Lost” Scritti Politti Canon: I Heard a Whisper
The trio continued work on “Small Talk,” a song started by Gamson and Gartside in the UK and was later re-mixed by [late-’70s Chic songwriter/producer/guitarist, Nile Rodgers. They had hoped to release it as the new Scritti Politti single, but a legal battle involving Green’s release from his Rough Trade contract prevented the single from seeing the light of day.
“Small Talk” would eventually appear as a track on Cupid & Psyche 85, but without the Rodgers re-mix. The track was produced by the band, while Howard Gray mixed:
Always a fan, FR&B has been on top of Rodgers’ 21st-century work also, as can be seen here:
Another song from this period written by Gartside and Gamson, “L Is for Lover” (included on our Playlist), was recorded by Al Jarreau and released as the title track of his 1986 studio album.
Also from ‘86, the penultimate song on the Playlist is “Love of a Lifetime” by Chaka Khan from her Destiny album on Warner Bros. worldwide. Both Gartside and Gamson wrote and produced the track (with Arif Mardin executive-producing).
That makes two songs on our Playlist not recorded by Scritti Politti! So, how can they be “covers,” you ask? They both were created, and exist solely in the Scritti universe: The Jarreau song, like the Khan song, was written by Green and Gamson. With Chaka’s song also being produced by the dynamic duo (who also can be heard singing at the start), we might just as easily have billed “Love of a Lifetime” as “Scritti Politti feat. Chaka Khan”!
As for Al Jarreau’s G&G song, none other than member-of-the-Scritti-family, Nile Rodgers, produced both song and album for Jarreau! By the way, in a bit of record label synchronicity, Khan, Scritti Politti, and Jarreau were all on Warner Bros. Records in 1986! As was Miles Davis, for that matter, and his “Perfect Way” cover on his ‘86 Tutu album.
Scritti Politti “Boom! There She Was,” U.S. Mix, 1988, Provision, written and produced by Gartside and Gamson (above)
Miles Davis “Perfect Way,” 1986, Tutu, written by Gartside and Gamson, produced by Marcus Miller and Tommy LiPuma
Tracye Eileen “Perfect Way”
Tracye, a seasoned jazz and pop singer, was born and raised in Chicago, and majored in business at Jackson State University.
“Mom had a vast collection of albums,” she told The Wall Street Journal’s Marc Myers in a 2022 interview. “I grew up listening to Ella Fitzgerald, Nancy Wilson, Dionne Warwick, Nina Simone and many other wonderful artists.
“I was a lead vocalist in my church choir for more than 30 years. The experience helped me with my vocals and my confidence as a performer. I was blessed being a soloist on a 10-city church-choir gospel tour in Switzerland about 15 years ago. It was a blast.
“My father became a very talented jazz drummer and percussionist. He almost went on tour with Count Basie, but had been drafted. A week before the tour, he was sent to Vietnam. My dad was a straight-ahead drummer and so smooth. Through the years, before I began to sing professionally, I sat in with his band to sing a few songs. In more recent years, he sat in with mine.”
Al Jarreau “L is For Lover,” 1986, L is For Lover, written by Gartside and Gamson, produced by Nile Rodgers
Nile Rodgers (l) performing onstage with Al Jarreau (r) at the former’s 34th birthday party, September 1986.
Rodgers, in the July 27, 2015 issue of New York Magazine called the album “the best thing I ever made that didn’t sell!”
J. D. Considine of Musician wrote, “It isn’t simply that Rodgers reins in the singer’s almost freakish virtuosity, although that helps; more to the point, the arrangements provide both focus and contrast for the singing, so that the flash bits truly excite. Best of all, with the Chic-style groove of ‘L is For Lovers,’ Rodgers ties the vocals so closely to the beat that it’s impossible not to be captivated.”
The Audio Thieves, “(Pray Like) Aretha Fanklin” (The Remix Radio Edit), UK and Australia release only, 2006, written by Gartside
The first Scritti Politti single to be released from the Cupid & Psyche 85 album was “Wood Beez (Pray Like Aretha Franklin)” in February 1984, its parenthetical subtitle alluding to the 1968 Aretha hit, “I Say a Little Prayer” (written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David) which Cupid producer Arif Mardin also worked on.
Chaka Khan “Love of a Lifetime,” 1986, Destiny, written by Gartside and Gamson
Our second Scritti Politti song never recorded by the band, this was Khan’s first single off her sixth studio album. With Green and Gamson writing and producing (and Green providing background vocals), this could be called “the great lost Scritti recording!”
The late, great Miles Davis often said, “She [Chaka] sings like my horn.”
Scritti Politti “All That We Are,” 1988, written and produced by Gartside and Gamson, Provision
According to Keyboard magazine, “much of the album bears Gamson’s [who played multiple keyboards, sequencers, and synths] stamp. In fact, his handiwork shows up in virtually every aspect of the record, from programming to sequencing. His crisp, jabbing patches have a poke-in-the-ribs feel that hustles Scritti songs along, and his intricate sequences have established him as one of the most inventive architects on the current dance-pop scene.”
More Scritti in Playlist form available here:
Scritti Politti, “Perfect Way,” live in Glasgow, 2021:
Great piece. I didn't know the Tracye Eileen cover. It's great. The Audio Thieves will not grace any of my playlists though 😁
I skimmed this and will have to go back and read more closely, but as always, I have no idea how you tie together so many threads in one article. I have enough trouble keeping one thought in my head! It's funny, people discount covers, but until the rock band era, actually it was rare for people perform their own stuff. What is classical music, other than expert musicians playing stuff written by expert composers? What is folk music--hell, we don't even know who wrote most folk songs. Sinatra, Fitzgerald and Elvis? Never wrote their own stuff. Ok, off to the gym and then I'll be back!