SOUNDTRACK: JULIANA HATFIELD-Sings Olivia Newton John (2018).
When I was a kid, I loved Grease. My parents took me to see it multiple times and I loved the soundtrack. There are still things from the movie that I am just “getting” now because I was so young when I first heard it. I listened and sang along to Grease thousands of time. I didn’t care for Saturday Night Fever (too dark and grown up), but i did love Xanadu. So clearly I loved Olivia more than John.
I did not love “Physical,” the only other ONJ song I had heard, but honestly who didn’t dance around singing the chorus.
Aside from those songs I didn’t know a lot about ONJ’s career. I had never heard of “Have You Never Been Mellow” until I bought the 1984 album by The Feederz. They covered the song in the only way that a band whose album cover was literally sandpaper (to mess up the neighboring albums) would do.
Decades later I loved Juliana Hatfield. I saw her live at Boston College (she opened for the B-52s and I left between acts because I was too cool for the B-52s). She sung heartfelt and direct songs in a sometimes childlike voice. But she rocked pretty hard too.
Juliana seems like an obvious choice to cover Olivia, except I didn’t think that Juliana had the range. But boy was I surprised. She hits high notes that I don’t recall her hitting before. And while her singing style is still pretty soft, she really powers through a lot. She also multitracks her voice from time to time to give it more power.
Plus, how great is that cover?
I didn’t know all of the songs on this but I grew to like the all. I like the gentle synths and the cool guitar line on “I Honestly Love You.” But she really impressed me with her take on Xanadu’s “Suspended in Time.” She hits some beautiful notes and really makes the song wonderful. I particularly like the e-bow. “Magic” from the soundtrack also sounds great. I’ve always liked this song so a cover has to meet some tough standards. “Xanadu” is another great version–JH nails this soundtrack.
She hits some really wonderful high notes on “Have You Never Been Mellow?” I’m still not sure if I’ve heard ONJ’s version.
“A Little More Love” adds some of Juliana’s crunchy guitar to the verses, but the chorus is pure ONJ.
I also had no idea she sang “Please Mr. Please,” which I remember from when I was a kid. Who was listening to country stations in New Jersey back then? Apparently much of ONJ’s pre-Grease career was in the country realm.
As I was going through this collection I discovered that ONJ sang a ton of versions of songs that I had no idea about.
Songs that she did a cover of which do not appear here:
- God Only Knows
- Jolene
- Me and Bobby McGee
- If You Could Read My Mind
- Angel of the Morning
- Take Me Home Country Roads
- Summertime Blues
- Ring of Fire
- He Ain’t Heavy…He’s My Brother [!]
- Don’t Cry for Me Argentina [!]
And that was all before she did Grease.
This collection mostly covers her records from Grease (1977) to Physical (1981), but there’s a couple of older songs too.
I had given up on her by Physical, but JH’s version of the title song has some nice chunky guitars and emphasizes the cool riff in the song–it’s much less discoey than the original. There’s even a loud (but short) guitar solo and some cool noise at the end. She also sounds a lot more like Juliana than Olivia on this one.
I didn’t know anything from Totally Hot, the album in which she dressed all in leather (like Sandy!). I feel like “Totally Hot” is the least successful song here. The lurching style is kind of clunky. Although JH is clearly having fun by the end with the multitarcked vocals.
“Don’t Stop Believin'” is not the Journey song. It sounds so very ONJ to me (with the high vocal notes at the end of each line). JH sounds a lot like ONJ on this one.
The biggest challenge has to have been “Hopelessly Devoted to You.” It’s the only song from Grease that she tackles. JH sounds a little flat (not in notes, but in…power?) during the verses. But the multi tracking on her voice makes the chorus sound wonderful.
“Dancin’ Round and Round” comes from that rockin’ Totally Hot album and JH covers it perfectly. “Make a Move on Me” has some interesting guitar and synth sounds.
The “I Honestly Love You” reprise is more fun because of the extended noisy guitar at the end.
This is a really fun collection of songs, including many songs I had forgotten I liked.
- I Honestly Love You [various, depending on country of release, you know, like The Beatles]
- Suspended In Time [X]
- Have You Never Been Mellow [HYNBM]
- A Little More Love [TH]
- Magic [X]
- Physical [P]
- Totally Hot [TH]
- Don’t Stop Believin’ [DSB]
- Please Mr. Please [HYNBM]
- Hopelessly Devoted To You [G]
- Xanadu [X]
- Dancin’ ‘Round And ‘Round [TH]
- Make A Move On Me [P]
X = Xanadu ; HYNBM = Have Yo Never Been Mellow ; [TH] = Totally Hot ; [P] = Physical ; [DSB] = Don’t Stop Believin’ ; [G] = Grease
[READ: January 29, 2019] Is This Guy for Real?
I enjoyed Box Brown’s Andre the Giant book. In fact I’m quite the fan of Box Brown’s work. So you bet I was going to read Brown’s biography about the enigma who was Andy Kaufman.
I was old enough to be aware of Kaufman (from Taxi, mostly), and young enough to be interested in the wrestling aspect of what he was doing. Even if I had no idea what was real during the whole thing. Apparently no one else did either. What’s interesting is that you probably couldn’t get away with these kinds of stunts now because of the pervasive media.
Andy Kaufman grew up as a pretty normal kid who liked Mighty Mouse, Elvis and wrestling. He also liked to imitate all three. The one unusual component of his arsenal of favorite things was Babatunde Olatunji a Nigerian drummer who played his high school. Andy was transfixed by the drums and set his mind to playing them. All of these would comprise his stand up act, (more…)
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Back in 2018, I saw Evan Dando play a solo set in Jersey City. It was him with an acoustic guitar and he played over forty songs.
