With their sublime confection of heartbreak and dancefloor power, Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt have never sounded like anyone else. Thirty years since Walking Wounded, here’s the duo’s very best
Releasing a version of the Cole Porter standard – previously recorded by Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald – as a debut single should have been an act of hubris. But Everything But the Girl’s (EBTG) version is fantastic, dolefully understated, effectively relocating the song to a grim bedsit in early 80s Britain.
Worldwide might be EBTG’s least-loved album. The duo’s sleeve notes for the deluxe edition are deeply equivocal about its merits, but it’s the deluxe version you need to hear the demo of British Summertime, stripped of its production gloss, rendered as a simple piano ballad, both careworn and lovely.
Unexpectedly resurrected during EBTG’s recent residency at London’s Moth Club, 25th December relegates Tracey Thorn’s voice to harmonies: instead, Ben Watt sings a song that melds sparkling guitars with doleful festive sentiment – a Christmas visit to parents prompting a rumination on the passing of time.
Released only four weeks after debut album Eden, Mine was a left turn away from its jazz-inflected sound, reflecting Thorn and Watt’s increasing fascination with the Smiths. It succeeded in confusing the public, barely denting the charts, but it’s a wonderful song, filled with empathy for its protagonist: an impoverished unmarried mother.
