21 May 1988
This double-A-side single was from a charity album of Beatles covers by 1988 pop and indie acts, in support of Childline in the UK, called Sgt. Pepper Knew My Father. Other tracks on the album include Sonic Youth doing ‘Within You Without You’, ‘Good Morning Good Morning’ by The Triffids, and ‘A Day In The Life’ as interpreted by The Fall. Even before you look them up online, I think we all know which one of those covers should have been the single.
But anyway, here’s Wet Wet Wet and Billy Bragg. As a child in 1988 I hadn’t heard either of those original Beatles songs before encountering these covers. I was also too young to appreciate the charms of Billy Bragg, and in any case ‘She’s Leaving Home’ is a bit too slow of pace to suit his flat folk-punk singing style. Tivey’s plaintive piano is a genuine improvement on the schmaltzy strings of the original, but her singing the parents’ lines with what sounds like a straight bat removes the sardonic undercurrent of Lennon; are we now meant to be sympathising with the parents and criticising the girl for leaving home, instead of empathising with her unhappiness and desire to escape as The Beatles do? While not a bad performance by Bragg and Tivey, I feel something has been lost.
No such uncertainty about the Wet Wet Wet track: it is bad. Talk about not getting the point – the original has the other Beatles singing supportive responses to Ringo, in acknowledgement of him being the coolest Beatle, but here Marti Pellow sings all the parts himself! By the end, when Pellow is showing off his pseudo-soul vocal contortions in a drizzle of cocktail-bar muzak, you wonder how he could have any friends at all. Little did we suspect in those innocent late-’80s days that Wet Wet Wet would one day return to our charts with an even worse ’60s cover version. A splendid time is guaranteed for all.
