999,868: Susan Boyle — Wild Horses

Have you ever thought that "Wild Horses" was perhaps just a little too pretty a song for Mick Jagger's hokey fake country-boy boy accent. You have? What, are you crazy? Fuck you. The Stones version is untouchable. Why don't you go and listen to the Sundays version of the song. You deserve it. I'm sorry, what's that? Flat affectless 90s quasi-alternative britpop isn't your thing? Well shit. I guess you're out of luck.

Or wait. Maybe I can help you. While I was just home for thanksgiving I found out that my sister had taught my mother "how to Youtube". What my mom chose to do with here new skill, with all the wealth of the internet spread out before her, was watch that Susan Boyle clip one million times. Thus all we listened to for the entire holiday weekend was Susan Boyle's debut album "I Dreamed a Dream". Fortunately, most of that album is made of precisisely the kind of music I can tune out with ease, but there is one track I found myself looking forward to, her cover of Wild Horses.

Is it damning with faint praise to say how surprised I was that this track is actually good? Then let me say that it's actually excellent. After listening to about 10 different covers of this song on Lala, I've determined it to be second only to the original. It tops Molly Hatchet. It tops Alicia Keys and Norah Jones. It even tops the Flying Burrito Brothers proto-version. Of all of them, it seems to be the only one that isn't trying to either blow your mind with their wildly original interpretation, or counting on some residual affection for the song to buoy up their lackluster take. Sure, instead of innovation, the piano and string arrangement we're given is pure boilerplate, but it breaths in a way that this sort of thing often doesn't, sweeping in a pulling back at all the right moments. The strings in particular add all the necessary lushness without ever tipping into heaviness.

So even if you've heard a million versions of this song (you have), you watched that Susan Boyle Youtube clip a million times (You did), and you think you know exactly what this song is going to sound like (you do), I suggest that you give it a listen anyway, if only to hear how Boyle's voice still packs a wallop even when it isn't attached to the image of its dumpy creator.

Wild Horses - Susan Boyle