CD Review: Kelly Lang – Drive – by Jeffrey Kurtis for Country Music News International Magazine & Radio Show
Kelly Lang
Drive
Leopard Entertainment
(Review written by: Jeffrey Kurtis)
There’s been several artists within the
country music genre who have recently released albums that honor the songs that
shaped them: Martina McBride with Everlasting, Trisha Yearwood with Let’s
Be Frank, and now, singer-songwriter Kelly Lang with Old Soul.
Lang is no stranger to lending her voice
to covers of iconic songs – look no further than the 2014 album Iconic Duets
with her husband T.G. Sheppard – but Old Soul gives us more of a solid look
into who she is as a songwriter and artist through a spattering of her
strongest influences. The album sees her tackling many different genres that
span several different era’s; Old Soul includes covers of The Police’s
“Every Breath You Take,” Bonnie Raitt’s “Something To Talk About,” “The
Righteous Brothers “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling,” and 11 more!
“With this album, I had no intention of
copying or being better than the originals. I am just honoring the songs that I
loved so much,” Lang has stated in recent interviews when talking about the
album.
There’s no better statement than that to
perfectly describe her new single “Drive,” her take on the #1 charting song originally
done in 1984 by The Cars on their Heartbeat City album.
Though Lang’s version of the song does
follow very closely to the original, especially within its instrumentation, she
does bring a noticeable sultry vibe to it that twists its familiarity into an
unexplored territory that you sense was always buried deep within the original version
of the song, but needed the foresight of an artist like Lang to bring it out.
Her smoother, soulful vocals are deeper
in tone when compared to Benjamin Orr’s (same singer as on The Cars smash hit
“Just What I Needed”) on the original version of the song, which is a key
factor to elevating it to a new level that gives it’s decisively 80’s feel a more
refreshed sound, while still doing exactly what she set out to do when
recording it; honoring the songs she loved so much!
Old Soulis due out on September 18th and is sponsored by Springer Mountain
Farms Chicken.
Check out the lyric video for “Drive”
at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7hTizE-V9I