KIRTSY MACCOLL
A-Side: Don't Come The Cowboy With Me, Sonny Jim!
B-Side: Other People's Lives
(Virgin 1990)
Kirsty MacColl, often used as a backing singer for people who were no where near as good as she was, released many great records of her own during her tragically short lifetime.
This single was one of several from her excellent album Kite, and suffers the all too common fate of being one record too many - something I previously noted a few weeks back with a Fleetwood Mac record.
There isn't that much wrong with Don't Come The Cowboy With Me, Sonny Jim! (apart, maybe, from the unwieldy title, but even that has an endearing quality to it). It's a pleasant enough ballad about lost and misplaced love - something that seems to feature a lot in Kirtsy MacColl's catalogue, and as is common in her songs she's the strong empowered woman who knows exactly what game the bloke is playing and won't let him get away with it. It swings gently in waltz time, largely acoustic with touches of steel guitar in the background, something which helps lift out of the pleasant but forgettable category, but it does kind of wash over you.
It's a shame that Other People's Lives doesn't do more to lift the record, it's a well crafted piece of pop about doomed unrequited love, but I've found there's little more that I can say about it.
I liked this record, I can clearly remember the songs, but I don't feel a connection or strong pull to either song, and whilst I'd be happy to hear either of them again. I wouldn't go seeking them out. That's a shame because Kirsty MacColl has so much more to offer than this - fortunately we'll be coming to some of them later on.
Next time something from a band whose entire recorded output is practically a genre in itself.
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