Blog: Bongo Jazz A Speciality

Dancing In The Street by Martha and the Vandellas is, without question, among the greatest recordings of the 20th century. Don't take my word for it: Ask members of the Library of Congress, who've chosen to preserve it in the U.S. National Recording Registry. So, you'd think other artists would leave well enough alone. Alas, this hasn't been the case and we live in a world with too many renditions of this Marvin Gaye-William Stevenson-Ivy Jo Hunter composition: most are simply adequate (Mamas and the Papas, Cilla Black); a few border on criminal (Van Halen and the excruciating Bowie-Jagger duet). [...]

• Fred Frith - Dancing In the Street / My Enemy Is a Bad Man