Thursday 14 December 2023

Ride On Time

 
Cover version of the month #93
The Bamboos cover Black Box

What was the best selling single of 1989?

Was it Jason Donovan with Too Many Broken Hearts? The Bangles gorgeous Eternal Flame? All Around The World by Lisa Stansfield? Maybe Like A Prayer by Madonna with the super sexy video? 

Nope ... it was Ride On Time by Black Box, an Italian house track that sold over 850,000 copies as it topped the charts for 6-weeks!

Ride On Time came out in the heady days of July 1989, a time that many classed as the second summer of love. House music was everywhere; in clubs and fields all over the country and it was crossing into the charts. 

With vocals by Heather Small, who went on to join Mike Pickering's M-People, Ride On Time was absolutely perfect for soundtracking the times. Small's vocal is deep, powerful and soulful, repeated time and time again so people can sing on first listen.

Piano house chords sound sublime, there are instrumental passages, a little breakdown with the glorious;

 Cause time won't take my love away

And then back into the beats and piano chords. Ride On Time is euphoric pop music, perfect for the charts, the radio and the clubs. The song still sounds super fresh, energetic and exciting over 30-years down the line.

Daniele Davoli from Black Box has said that Ride On Time was the group's attempt to create a song with the power of Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple with a dance beat!

I'm not sure how to judge him against that - but he created a winner! 

Originally released with a sample of Loletta Holloway's Love Sensation. The band thought she was singing ride on time, when in fact Holloway sings want you right on time. But they stuck with Ride On Time.

Their luck was in. Paul Oakenfold was in Italy looking for Italo-house records and discovered their pressings, subsequently buying up all the copies he could get his hands on.

The rest ... as they say ... is history. The song just blew up and rightly so, it's a classic of its time.

I stumbled across The Bamboos cover of Ride On Time after listening to the band The Allergies on Spotify. Algorythms kicked in and before I knew it I was googling to see if this was the original version of Ride On Time.

It turns out that it is a cover from Hard Up, The Bamboos 2021 album. 

The Bamboos are a soulful deep funk outfit from Australia who have progressed to incorporating hip-hop, psychedelic pop and cinematic music into their sound. They've been releasing music since 2004 and have developed considerably since that time, getting their music into computer games and on to TV shows like Greys Anatomy.

The Aussies remain pretty true to the original, just funking it up a little with live instruments rather than samples. The big vocal is still there, the piano chords are still vital, but the beats and percussion sound live, the bass groove is sublime, holding it all together and allowing huge horns to come in.

It's an absolute delight. An inspired choice of cover.

Enjoy.

The Black Box original and The Bamboos cover version are added to my Everything Flows Cool Cover Versions playlist on Spotify which also features all of the songs below. Search for the title or CLICK HERE

Black Box - official video

The Bamboos - official video

Previous covers of the month blogs

13. Hurt
39. ABBA-esque
40. Jumpin' Jack Flash
64. Lola
82. Drop
87. Indian Rope Man + bonus Strawberry Fields Forever + This Wheels On Fire


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