‘Perfect Day’: Sharon Van Etten’s greatest cover
Sharon Van Etten knows how to write great songs. Each of her albums has been filled with them, from her 2009 debut album, Because I Was in Love, through her 2019 album of the year contender Remind Me Tomorrow, to her most recent release, We’ve Been Going About This All Wrong. Each new record has exhibited her way with words and her powerful voice.
To celebrate the tenth anniversary of her sophomore album Epic in 2021, Van Etten assembled a collection of covers of each of the album’s seven songs, which was then released as Epic Ten. Including performances from artists who had inspired her, like Fiona Apple and Lucinda Williams, as well as her contemporaries Courtney Barnett and Shamir, the album opened up new musical avenues for the songs and shone new lights on their inner workings and meanings.
Van Etten is no stranger to doing this herself. In addition to being a great writer, she is also a great performer, with a huge emotional range and depth in her singing and a powerful command of her voice.
It is not just the quality of Van Etten’s covers that is impressive, but also the quality of the songs that she chooses to cover. She has a great ear for a great song. She can equally shine a light on songs that have not been endlessly covered before, as she can take a familiar tune and make it her own.
In 2017, Van Etten contributed to the Resistance Radio: The Man in the High Castle covers compilation album. Singing an ethereal, lilting and gut-wrenching rendition of the Arthur Kent and Sylvia Dee song ‘The End of the World’, first made famous by Skeeter Davies in 1962, Van Etten wrung every ounce of emotion from the lyric. Backed by a weeping steel guitar, an intimate band, and lush strings, there is longing and loss in her voice, which is expertly mirrored by the music. Alongside her future collaborator Angel Olsen’s version of ‘Who’s Sorry Now’, ‘The End of the World’ is the best recording on the album.
There is also a huge range of artists and writers that Van Etten has covered, including the genres and time periods that she draws from. From Nick Cave and the Flaming Lips to Sinéad O’Connor and Portishead, Elvis Presley to Nine Inch Nails, Kris Kristofferson, REM, and even The Proclaimers, she casts a wide net when looking for a song to sing.
In her cover of Karen Dalton’s ‘Remembering Mountains’, she manages to make the song sound entirely like it’s her own – but still brings some of the qualities to her performance that made Dalton such a special singer: a sleepy, weary and soulful edge that has got a moving, alluring and understated power to it.
But perhaps the best of all of Sharon Van Etten’s covers was one where she could show off both that understated power in her voice and the more explosive side of her singing.
Like Karen Dalton, Lou Reed wielded a weary and washed-out voice, which hangs dreamily in the air through the verses of his greatest song, ‘Perfect Day’. In a live cover of the song at the Brooklyn Bowl in 2014, backed by Deer Tick – themselves no stranger to a great cover – Van Etten exhibited the full range of her voice and brought such emotion and intensity to the performance. Mirroring Reed’s East Coast drawl with her own, she blurs the words of the verses together, melting into the backing wash of guitars and string sounds at times before erupting into the chorus. As she belts the refrain, she opens up the full power of both her lungs and the lyrics, bringing such a visceral, emotional intensity to the song.
Van Etten is currently gearing up to release her new album, and the first with her new band Sharon Van Etten & the Attachment Theory. The self-titled release will arrive in early February 2025, with the group set to tour in support of the album. Perhaps, alongside any live debuts of their new material, we’ll also see some exciting new covers, as well.
