Cooking Vinyl
Pop, 2021
Gosh, how long has it been since I listened to an album by Will Young? Okay, I confess I only recall him after seeing him on the third season of The Masked Singer UK, and yes, I recognized his voice right away. Looking up his discography, it seems like I have missed out on a few of his past albums.
Crying on the Bathroom Floor is a most intriguing title, but it’s his most recent album, so it looks like a nice place to start. Let’s see how his sound has matured over the years…
Oh, this is an album of cover versions. That’s disappointing. Sure, he’s covering songs made famous by female acts, but the problem with cover versions is that I can’t help comparing his version of these songs with the originals.
Will Young’s sound has evolved into this smooth, mellow sound that is a fusion of pop and jazz. It’s not a bad sound at all, and in fact, his kind of music can be nice soothing ear wax. Unfortunately, his sound is not… exciting, to put it nicely.
This is most evident in his version of Lykke Li’s I Follow Rivers. I hate to say it, but there is no way his voice can compare to the crisp, distinctive nasally vocals of Lykke Li or the way the beats of the original song just bop along like a deadly ear infection. Here, Mr Young’s version is more sedate, although still mid-tempo, song. I am hoping that he would show more enthusiasm or passion during the chorus, but no, it’s just him going “I, I follow…” like he’s reading aloud the line from a sheet of paper. I can do stupid dances to the original, but I’m hard pressed to even nod my head to this one. His version is not bad, mind you, but I have heard the original many, many times already as it’s one of my favorite tunes, and his just feels lacking in comparison.
It’s the same with his version of Robyn’s Indestructible. Robyn’s version is a dance track that is also weirdly sensual at the same time, and the chorus is fabulous. The whole thing is a mix of camp and fun that only the Swedes can deliver. Will Young’s version, however, is just a song that has a bloke singing on it. Again, it’s not bad, but I keep hearing the original in my head as this song plays, because I infinitely prefer Robyn’s version.
It’s the same with the rest of the songs here. The closest the original and Mr Young’s version come close is Missing, his cover of the hit song by Everything but the Girl. His vocal inflections are similar to Ms Thorne’s in the original, so his version is spiritually very close to the original. In fact, this one actually feels like a fresher and more modern update of the original, something that I oddly can’t say the same for the other tracks on this album.
Anyway, I like that for the most part Mr Young picked an eclectic selection of songs to cover here. For example, he could have done another version of Dolly Parton’s I Will Always Love You, for example, but instead he goes for Cam’s Till There’s Nothing Left. While I much prefer the original, his version isn’t bad at all, and who knows, he may help Cam get a few more new fans in the process.
At any rate, I like Crying on the Bathroom Floor—I suppose it’s either this or Everything Is Embarrassing for the title of this album, heh—because it is a cohesive, solid display of Mr Young’s smooth beats that can work wonders to lighten up one’s mood. However, he has the misfortune here to cover songs in a way that I find to be inferior to the original versions. Does that make this a bad album? I don’t think so, but I’d much prefer he applies his brand of music onto original tracks.
