James Bay - Scars

Joe writes: This is the first James Bay track I've really liked, but I do really like it.

OMI - Cheerleader (Felix Jaehn Remix) and Kygo - Firestone

Joe writes: Two massive tracks from round the world that haven't happened in the UK yet:

Emile Haynie feat. Lana Del Rey - Wait For Life

Joe writes: Magic

Emmy The Great - Swimming Pool

Joe writes: Someone on YouTube described this as Lana Del Rey without the artifice which seems accurate.

Jeff Buckley - Mama You Been On My Mind

Joe writes: Lapsley did the bedtime mix on Annie Mac's Radio 1 show last night including Jeff Buckley's cover of this early Dylan break up song:




Jeff Buckley was a brilliant interpreter of other people's songs. He needed nothing more than a guitar and vocal to elevate them into something magical (he reminds me of Eva Cassidy in this respect).

I've just added this to my Spotify playlist of favourite Dylan songs:

Ona Watson - Take This Job And Shove It

Joe writes: I heard this on Cerys Matthew's excellent 6 Music show. She prefaced it by saying that a large proportion of people who quit their jobs do so in January. It's a 1978 cover of a song by David Allen Coe. It wasn't a hit and Ona doesn't appear to have recorded again, but he's still performing in Birmingham, Alabama. The track is hard to find but it has been compiled by the excellent Tony Rounce on the album Cold Cold Heart: Where Country Meets Soul volume 3, which is available here.

Bob Seger inspired Prince to write Purple Rain

...as this article explains (it also explains a lot of other fascinating stuff about Purple Rain).

Joe writes: So here are my two favourite Bob Seger songs.

We've Got Tonight - you can hear how this might have inspired Purple Rain:

and Still The Same, which my dad used to sing all through my childhood, but didn't own, so I didn't hear the Bob Seger version of it until years later:

and here's Purple Rain which is even better than the best of Bob Seger: