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Luther Vandross would have celebrated his 61st Birthday this week and to celebrate, a new album of deep-catalogue rarities have been collated including this beautiful cover of Kenny Rogers’ original.

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‘Buy Me A Rose’ is classic Luther love song. Soft and tender with all the much-loved musical effects: angelic voiced backing singers, chimes and an atmospheric acoustic guitar. It is the musical equivalent of a bed scattered in petals.

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Old fashioned chivalry features heavily in the lyrics and as everyone knows, Luther knew how to treat a girl good. 

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Hidden Gems is released today and features some of the most loved album tracks from across seven albums of material spanning Luther’s 15 year tenure at Epic Records.

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DB

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Everyone loves an early 60’s crooner and Bobby Vinton is certainly one of the gang. The “Polish Prince” has a blue velvety voice enough to make Ross Kemp go weak at the knees. Unlike the modern day exponents of the love song Bobby Vinton has a sincere, beautiful tone and innocent intentions. He is in a different class to those Usher-types surrounded by bikini-clad women grinding with all and sundry.

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‘Trouble Is My Middle Name’, unlike most of Vinton’s love songs, is a minor key ballad warning his “little girl” that he is not good enough for her and that he will only bring trouble into her life. Beginning with a military snare drum and employing the diminished 7^th interval freely the overwhelming regret and sadness of the song is brought to the fore.

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So have a sweet 2 mins 27 secs in your day and remember the good old days of innocence and chastity and lose yourself in the cavernous dulcet tones of Bobby Vinton.

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DB

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Top of the morning to you! In the run up to St Paddy’s Day we will be focussing in on all things green and leprechaunic and here is your first instalment of Blarney.

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Its Monday morning and the question on everyone’s lips is “how was your weekend?”. All responses so far have been fairly mundane; hangovers, gym sessions, malfunctioning toilets and sporting injuries. If only someone had a story akin to the one told by Christy Moore in his track ‘Weekend In Amsterdam’ from his newest album Folk Tale. ’Weekend In Amsterdam‘ is a comic tale of a group visiting the European capital of stag dos sung in Christy Moore’s instantly-recognisable, understated dulcet tones. With a catchy refrain and the patter of clever lyrics detailing the exponentially risqué weekenders, this song is sure to put a smile on your face.

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For those of you who haven’t come across Christy Moore before, he is well worth a listen. Voted in 2007 as Ireland’s greatest living musician in RTE’s People Of The Year Awards, he is a prolific recording artist (having released 25 solo albums alone) notable for his songs containing witty narrative and socio-political commentary. However his astonishingly warm voice also lends itself beautifully to more traditional Irish folk ballads like ‘Ballydine’ and ‘Folk Tale’.

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DB

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You can also check out our St Patrick’s Day playlist over on Spotify

The wedding season is fast approaching and with talk of matrimonial bliss and drunken fumblings with bridesmaids aplenty, my mind turned to one of my favourite Springsteen songs for refuge. Set on a wedding day, this song is miles apart from those overexposed cheesy first-dance favourites currently invading the office airwaves. ‘Walk Like A Man’ is a touching and thought provoking album track from Springsteen’s 8^th studio album Tunnel Of Love and unlike the many gushing songs about love and future happiness this melancholy ballad depicts a groom standing at the front of a church awaiting his bride and wishing his father were still alive to guide him through the next chapter of his life; to show him how to “walk like a man”.

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The song itself is simple and unfussy: a repetitive descending chord progression provides the foundation for a melody which at no point dominates the poetry of the lyrics. The story is allowed room to resonate with the listener who is transfixed by the heart-breaking but ultimately uplifting narrative.

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Tunnel of Love, released in 1987, was an introspective album following his huge popular success of the mid-80s and is a true insight into Springsteen’s troubled personal life—soon after the release of this album he filed for divorce from his first wife Julianne Phillips. So there we go, a rather depressing loop from marriage to divorce, but I suppose what Bruce is getting at in ‘Walk Like A Man’ is that, whatever happens, the most important thing is always to try to be the best you can be…

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“I’ll do what I can, I’ll walk like a man, and I’ll keep on walkin’”

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DB