Various Artists - The Hitmakers Sing Bill Withers (2020)

William Harrison Withers Jr. was born on 4 July 1938 in the small coal mining town of Slab Fork, West Virginia, and following his parent's divorce when he was three, he was raised by his mother's family in nearby Beckley, West Virginia. At 17 he enlisted in the United States Navy and served for nine years, during which time he became interested in singing and writing songs. He left the Navy in 1965, relocating to Los Angeles in 1967 to start a music career, releasing his first single 'Three Nights And A Morning' later that year, and although the song went unnoticed at the time, he later reworked it as the track 'Harlem'. He worked as a mechanical assembler for several different companies, including Douglas Aircraft Corporation, IBM and Ford during the day, while recording demo tapes with his own money, shopping them around, and performing in clubs at night. When he hit with the song 'Ain't No Sunshine' in 1971, he refused to resign from his job because he believed the music business was a fickle industry. In early 1970, Withers' demo tape was auditioned favourably by Clarence Avant, owner of Sussex Records, who signed him to a record deal and assigned former Stax Records stalwart Booker T. Jones to produce his first album. 'Just As I Am' was released in 1971 with the tracks 'Ain't No Sunshine' and 'Grandma's Hands' as singles, and with the album being a success he began touring with a band assembled from members of the Watts 103rd Street Rhythm Band. 'Ain't No Sunshine' won a Grammy Award for Best R&B Song at the 14th Annual Grammy Awards in 1972, with the track selling over one million copies, and being awarded a gold disc by the RIAA in September 1971. During a hiatus from touring, Withers recorded his second album, 'Still Bill', and the lead single 'Lean On Me' went to number one the week of 8 July 1972, being his second gold single, with confirmed sales in excess of three million. His follow-up record, 'Use Me' was released in August 1972, and it became his third million-seller, with the R.I.A.A. gold disc award taking place on 12 October 1972. With three million-sellers under his belt, other artists began coming to him to write for them, and he contributed two songs to Gladys Knight & the Pips' 1974 album 'I Feel A Song', but other artists were happy just to cover tracks from his first two records, with most of the songs from 'Still Bill' receiving this treatment by 1973. The final two tracks were covered in 2019 and 2020 and so we can now enjoy this alternate look at Bill Withers' second studio album in full. 

Track listing

01 Lonely Town, Lonely Street (Denny Greene 1973)
02 Let Me In Your Life (Barbara Mason 1972) 
03 Who Is He (And What Is He To You)? (Gladys Knight & The Pips 1973)
04 Use Me (Scott Walker 1973)
05 Lean On Me (Tom Jones 1973) 
06 Kissing My Love (Cold Blood 1973)  
07 I Don't Know (Caitlin Krisko And The Broadcast 2020)
08 Another Day To Run (Carla Hassett 2011)
09 I Don't Want You On My Mind (Carol Grimes 1974)
10 Take It All In And Check It All Out (Joseph Malik 2019)

Johnny Marr - ...and on guitar (2010)

John Martin Maher (aka Johnny Marr) was born on 31 October 1963, and originally had aspirations to become a professional footballer, being approached by Nottingham Forest, and securing trials with Manchester City. At the age of 13, Marr's family moved him to a new neighbourhood in Manchester where he met up with a bunch of guitar players which changed his life, including The Cult guitarist Billy Duffy, who Marr would listen to rehearsing across the street from his new house. He formed his first band at 13 with Andy Rourke and Kevin Williams, and The Paris Valentinos performed at a Jubilee party in Benchill in June 1977, playing Rolling Stones and Thin Lizzy covers. In 1979 he re-united with Rourke in White Dice, who won a demo-tape competition organised by the NME, for which the prize was an audition with F-Beat Records, although it didn't result in a record deal. In October 1980, Marr enrolled at Wythenshawe College, and after White Dice dissolved in 1981, he and Rourke formed a funk band, Freak Party, with Simon Wolstencroft on drums. By early 1982 Freak Party had fizzled out, being unable to find a vocalist, so Marr approached Rob Allman, singer in White Dice, who suggested Steven Morrissey, a singer with the short-lived punk band the Nosebleeds. Marr approached a mutual friend asking to be introduced and they visited Morrissey at his house in Kings Road, Stretford in May 1981. With the line-up of The Smiths completed with he addition of Mike Joyce on drums, the band signed to Rough Trade Records and released their first single 'Hand In Glove' in 1983. 

By February 1984, the band's fanbase was sufficiently large to launch the band's long-awaited eponymous debut album to number two in the UK chart. Early in 1985, the band released their second album 'Meat Is Murder', which was more strident and political than its predecessor, becoming the band's only album (barring compilations) to reach number one in the UK charts. In 1986 the band released 'The Queen Is Dead', an album which has consistently topped polls of the greatest albums ever made, but despite their continued success, personal differences within the band, including the increasingly strained relationship between Morrissey and Marr, saw them on the verge of splitting. In July 1987, Marr left the group, and auditions to find a replacement for him proved fruitless. By the time 'Strangeways, Here We Come' was released in September, the band had split. The breakdown in the relationship has been primarily attributed to Morrissey's becoming annoyed by Marr's work with other artists, and this collection shows that he did offer his services to a number of artists between 1984 and 2010, although seemingly not that many while he was still a member of The Smiths. In August 1987, he was very briefly an official member of the Pretenders, touring with the band and appearing on the single 'Windows Of The World', and after leaving The Pretenders he recorded and toured with The The from 1988 to 1994, recording two albums with the group. He simultaneously formed Electronic with New Order's Bernard Sumner, releasing three albums during the 90's, and in 1992 he recorded a cover version of Ennio Morricone's 'The Good, The Bad And The Ugly' with Billy Duffy for the NME compilation 'Ruby Trax'. He's also worked as a session musician and writing collaborator for artists including Pet Shop Boys, Billy Bragg, Tom Jones, Kirsty MacColl, Black Grape, Talking Heads, and Beck, and this double disc set shows the wide variety of artists who have felt that having Marr added to their music would make it just that little bit special.  

Track listing

Disc One
01 Hand In Glove (single by Sandie Shaw 1984)
02 Greetings To The New Brunette (single by Billy Bragg 1986)
03 Windows Of The World (single by The Pretenders 1988)
04 (Nothing But) Flowers (from 'Naked' by Talking Heads 1988)
05 Still Feel The Rain (single by Stex 1990)
06 This Must Be The Place I Waited Years To Leave (from 'Behaviour' by Pet Shop Boys 1990)
07 Walking Down Madison (from 'Electric Landlady' by Kirsty MacColl 1991)
08 This Is Your Life (from 'Ripe' by Banderas 1991)
09 The Good, The Bad And The Ugly (from the 'Ruby Trax' compilation 1992)
09 Dogs Of Lust (single by The The 1993)
10 Rays Of The Rising Sun (single by Denise Johnson 1994)

Disc Two
01 Fat Neck (single by Black Grape 1996)
02 Rhythm And Blues (from 'Fresco' by M People 1997)
03 Lust For Life (from 'Reload' by Tom Jones 1999)
04 Milk And Honey (from 'Midnite Vultures' by Beck 1999)
05 Fool's Mate (from 'Crimson Tide' by Bert Jansch 2000)  
06 (Probably) All In The Mind (from 'Heathen Chemistry' by Oasis 2002)
07 Even A Child (from 'Time On Earth' by Crowded House 2007)
08 Enough Of Me (from 'The Empyrean' by John Frusciante 2009) 
09 The Whale Song (from 'No One's First, And You're Next' by Modest Mouse 2009)
10 Ordinary Millionaire (from 'Propellor Time' by Robyn Hitchcock & The Venus 3 2010) 

Thanks to the Anonymous comment just before Christmas for suggesting this one.

Tom Jones - This And That (1967)

Thomas John Woodward (aka Tom Jones) was born on 7 June 1940 in Pontypridd, Glamorgan, in South Wales, and began singing at an early age, regularly performing at family gatherings, weddings and in his school choir. His bluesy singing style developed out of the sound of American soul music, and his early influences included blues, R&B and rock and roll singers Little Richard, Solomon Burke, Jackie Wilson, Brook Benton, Elvis Presley and Jerry Lee Lewis. In 1963 he became the frontman for Tommy Scott and the Senators, a Welsh beat group, and in 1964 he recorded several solo tracks with producer Joe Meek, who took them to various record labels with little success, although these tracks would later surface after he'd started to have hit singles, much to the annoyance of Jones and his management. Later that year, Decca producer Peter Sullivan saw Tommy Scott and the Senators performing in a club and directed them to manager Phil Solomon for a short-lived partnership. The group continued to play gigs at dance halls and working men's clubs in South Wales, and one night Jones was spotted by Gordon Mills, a London-based manager who also originally hailed from South Wales. Mills became Jones' manager, and took the young singer to London, renaming him to exploit the popularity of the Academy Award-winning 1963 film of the same name. Eventually, Mills brokered a deal with Decca Records, and Jones' first single 'Chills And Fever' was released in late 1964. It didn't chart, but the follow-up 'It's Not Unusual' became an international hit after offshore pirate radio station Radio Caroline promoted it. The following year was the most prominent of Jones's career, making him one of the most popular vocalists of the British Invasion, and in early 1965 'It's Not Unusual' reached the No. 1 spot in the UK charts, and the top ten in the United States. During 1965 Mills secured a number of film themes for Jones to record, including 'What's New Pussycat?' and the James Bond film 'Thunderball' in 1965, and 'Promise Her Anything' and the thriller 'Triple Cross' in 1966. Around this time his popularity began to slip somewhat, so Mills tried to reshape Jones' image into that of a crooner, recording material that appealed to a wider audience, such as the country hit 'Green, Green Grass Of Home'. The strategy worked, gaining him another No. 1 hit in the UK, and further chart successes on both sides of the Atlantic over the next few years, including the classic 'Delilah' in 1968. An imminent box-set will showcase all of Jones' Decca albums, and will be welcomed by fans, as his discography is a bit disjointed, with UK and US albums having different track-listings, and often his UK albums weren't released in the US, and vice-versa. There were also a number of singles and their b-sides which didn't appear on his UK albums, particularly the afore-mentioned film themes, and so in preparation for the box-set here is a collection of his non-album recordings from the first four years of his career, starting with that very first single in 1964, through to the start of his crooner phase with 'Green, Green Grass Of Home' and 'I'll Never Fall In Love Again'.   

 
Track listing

01 Chills And Fever (single 1964)   
02 Breathless (b-side of 'Chills And Fever')
03 To Wait For Love (Is To Waste Your Life Aaway) (b-side of 'It's Not Unusual' 1965)
04 I Tell The Sea (b-side of 'Once Upon A Time' 1965)
05 With These Hands (single 1965)  
06 Untrue (b-side of 'With These Hands')
07 What's New Pussycat? (single from the film 'What's New Pussycat?' 1965) 
08 One More Chance (b-side of 'What's New Pussycat?')
09 Thunderball (single from the film 'Thunderball' 1966) 
10 Promise Her Anything (single from the film 'Promise Her Anything' 1966) 
11 Stop Breaking My Heart (single 1966) 
12 Never Give Away Love (b-side of 'Stop Breaking My Heart')
13 Triple Cross (single from the film 'Triple Cross' 1966) 
14 Not Responsible (single 1966) 
15 What A Party (single 1966) 
16 City Girl (b-side of 'What A Party')
17 This And That (single 1966) 
18 If I Had You (b-side of 'Green, Green Grass Of Home' 1966)  
19 Ten Guitars (b-side of 'Detroit City' 1967)
20 Things I Wanna Do (b-side of 'I'll Never Fall in Love Again' 1967)
21 I'm Coming Home (single 1967)