The original No Doubt version of 'Just A Girl' was a fast, relentless and unyielding slice of angry ska tinged pop punk released in 1995. It followed in the wake of 'Don't Speak', the bands epic alt ballad, which spent three weeks at number 1 in the UK.
Given that Yellowjackets (season two of which will be featuring the Florence + The Machine version of 'Just A Girl') is set partially in 1996, the choice of the song feels like no accident: The songs lyrics lambast the many ways in which girls and women are made to feel powerless and controlled by society but, at the same time, Yellowjackets is a thriller with a female dominated cast which has, at its heart, the long term impact and trauma of a kind of female Lord Of The Flies series of events on the adult survivors of a plane crash.
I mean, you can see why they thought of Florence Welch, can't you? Darkness? Check. Rage? Check. Pain? Check.
Under the hands of Florence + The Machine what was once a pretty straightforward song becomes a sprawling, multilayered, highly atmospheric and sinister journey into the abyss. "Don't, in any way, hold back" the brief might well have been, though - according to Welch - it was in fact to create something "Deeply unsettling". Reminiscent in places of Miranda Sex Garden's equally creepy take on 'In Heaven (lady in the radiator song)' from Eraserhead*, Welch has been given free range with her vocals, meaning that at times she steers close to Gwen Stefani's original vocal (Stefani was an early musical idol of hers) and at times allows her vocals to soar to ethereal highs or lower to angry growls, depending on what is required.
The Dance Fever tour is currently in its Australia and New Zealand leg, and there has been a certain amount of excited anticipation amongst the Florence fan networks on Twitter in recent days about whether the band will perform 'Just A Girl' live or not.
Whether this happens or not, the Florence + The Machine version of 'Just A Girl' represents a tremendous tour de force.
* 'In Heaven (lady in the radiator song) is taken from the 1993 album Suspiria, which also features Katherine Blake delivering an incredibly maudlin, slow down gothic jazz take on 'My Funny Valentine'.
No comments:
Post a Comment