Trust In Me - Holly Cole Trio
A big happy birthday to Bruce Reitherman who was born on this day in 1955. Aside from being the son of the famous Disney animator/director Wolfgang Reitherman, Bruce was also the voice of Christopher Robin in The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh and Mowgli in The Jungle Book.

Today's cover is a dark and haunting version of Trust In Me by Canadian jazz singer HOLLY COLE and her trio. The song can be found on her 1991 album BLAME IN ON MY YOUTH, her second album which was made up of covers of jazz, rock and showtunes songs. Her following album, DON'T SMOKE IN BED, is made entirely of Tom Waits cover songs!

Trust In Me Holly Cole Trio 1991

Labels: blame it on my youth, holly cole trio, jazz, jungle book, trust in me

  ¶ 6:35 AM 1 Comments Links to this post

  Trust In Me - Susheela Raman
Born in London, SUSHEELA RAMAN moved to Australia when she was four but her parents, who were from Tamil Nadu, wanted to keep their Tamil culture alive. They taught their daughter South Indian classical music which started Shusheela's love for music of many origins.

As a teenager she formed a rock band which later started to adopt some funk, blues and jazz. But it wasn't until she traveled to India to rediscover her roots that her music started to form what it is today.

In 1997, when she returned from India, she started working with guitarist/producer Sam Mills on music that would feature musicians from all over the world. Featured on Trust In Me off of her first album, SALT RAIN, is the Egyptian percussion virtuoso Hosam Ramzi.

Sam Mills had this to say about the making of the Jungle Book cover:

Hosam is known worldwide as the ‘King of Belly Dance’ and also played to great effect on our version of Trust in Me which is a kind of oriental cha-cha-cha. Trust in Me is of course taken from the Jungle Book. Like millions of others, we grew with these songs, but after Susheela and I met we both discovered that we had been thinking about covering this particular tune. Getting the right tone was quite tricky. The snake Kaa, who sings it in the film, is an evil seducer, so Susheela had to get into character for it. I think she’s still recovering.

All in all, this is a great cover and a real example or 'world music'.

Trust In Me Susheela Raman 2001

Labels: jungle book, salt rain, susheela raman, trust in me

  ¶ 9:23 AM 3 Comments Links to this post

  Trust In Me - Belly
Brian Ibbott visiting again from Coverville. Kurtis was nice enough to invite me to guest post during Villains Week (heyyyyy, wait a minute...), and even before I knew the theme for the week, I had my song picked out.

Today's song originally comes from the 1967 animated adaptation of Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book. Speaking personally, it's hard to think of any of the villains of Jungle Book as villains. You look at Cruella De Vil? She chose to be evil. How about Jafar? Again, voluntarily wicked. But the antagonists in Jungle Book were really just being their animal-instinct selves. Shere Khan is a tiger, for pete's sake. What's he going to do? Suddenly become a vegetarian? King Louie is just satisfying the curiosity of his baboon-like obsession with fire. And then there's Kaa. Kaa the boa constrictor, who captures Mowgli and hypnotizes him to the strains of Trust In Me, a slithery slink of a song, with the hopes of dining on him. Snakelike behavior? Okay, maybe not the hypnotism, but you get the picture.

Siouxie and the Banshees' version of Trust In Me may be more well known, but the cover by BELLY should not be discounted. On my cover song-based podcast, Coverville, I featured the lineage of the band Belly in episode 352. Stepsisters Kristin Hersh and Tanya Donnelly formed Throwing Muses in the early 1980's. In 1990, Donnelly started working with the Pixies' Kim Deal in a band called The Breeders, and shortly afterwards, left the Muses. And as if she weren't busy enough, Donnelly formed a new band, Belly, that same year. Belly's biggest hit came in 1991, a confusing track called Feed The Tree. And staying together (through a couple lineup changes) through 1996, Tree remained their biggest hit.

Appearing on the Japanese exclusive BABY SILVERTOOTH in 1993 and their 2002 BEST OF compilation, Belly's take on Trust In Me is less sinister without Siouxie's vocals, but Tanya's octave-higher performance makes the song more hypnotic. In fact, listening to it now, I...

Trust In Me Belly 1993

Labels: belly, jungle book, rock, sweet ride, trust in me

  ¶ 7:07 AM 4 Comments Links to this post

  Trust In Me - Siouxsie & the Banshees
Check out this Jungle Book cover of Trust In Me by glam-post-punk rock band SIOUXSIE & THE BANSHEES.

I have never heard of this band before but upon doing some research, it looks like they has a very successful career in the UK and recorded eleven albums! The album you can find Trust In Me is a cover album released in 1987 called THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS. You can find covers of everyone from Billy Holiday, Iggy Pop, the Doors, Sparks and Kraftwerk!

So far I have only heard this one track but their style seems to really work! It has a great feel and very creative uses of the harp! I think it would be more likely for me to by hypnotized by the singing in this version rather than the Sterling Holloway original.

Siouxsie & the Banshees were active from 1976-1996 but the lead singer, Siouxsie Sioux, is still releasing albums! In fact one came out last month!

Trust In Me Siouxsie & the Banshees 1987

Labels: jungle book, pop, siouxsie and the banshees, through the looking glass, trust in me

  ¶ 7:20 AM 2 Comments Links to this post