Smith – Baby It’s You

11th February 2025 · 1960s, 1969, Music, Soul

Here’s a ’60s band I’ve never heard of before, a female-fronted outfit with the disappointingly humdrum name of Smith, with their solitary hit single – a cover of Baby It’s You.

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Dobie Gray’s stomper Out On The Floor has been called the best Northern Soul record of all time, though I remember Dobie Gray for two other songs – Drift Away and The In-Crowd.

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Kelis – Milkshake

6th February 2025 · 2000s, 2003, Hip-Hop, Music

It’s impossible to forget this tune once you’ve heard it because it lives inside your head for ever and will pop back whenever you hear the word Milkshake for the rest of your life.

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Like everyone else I know* I discovered Bob Marley when the live version of No Woman, No Cry became a huge hit in the summer of 1975. Then I dug deeper and discovered this tune from five years earlier.

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You can’t see him in this footage but this is the moment keyboard player Barry Goldberg – who died in January -became part of one of the most historic gigs in musical history.

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The Saints, who formed in Australia in 1973, were arguably the first punk band of all – but they always claimed not to be punks. Whatever they were, they were fantastic.

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French vocal trio Belle Epoque had their biggest (and possibly only) hit single in 1977 with disco classic Black Is Black.

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It takes a bold and courageous artist to re-record her signature song after more than half a century, but Marianne Faithfull was nothing if not brave.

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This is the song that gave The Rolling Stones their first big US hit and helped make Irma Thomas the Soul Queen of New Orleans.

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Mina – You Are My Destiny

29th January 2025 · 1960, 1960s, Music

I love a torch song as much as the next sentimental fool. So I was thrilled when this one made an appearance in The Brutalist.

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