Ever looked back at an old picture of yourself and been reminded of the time when it was taken; the people you hung out with, the loves you endured, that terrible Wednesday night down the student union when you tripped over attempting the "special dance" to Whigfield's Saturday Night?
This must be a similar experience to that which artists go through when looking back at videos of their old hits. In 1979, when he first released Gangsters as part of The Specials, all Terry Hall had to worry about was whether the hems of his Sta-Prests were the requisite circumference. Now aged 47, he has just re-recorded the song as part of big beat alco-anarchists turned musicianly types Dub Pistols. Is it such a good idea to revisit your old hits when cynics might suggest you are only going to remind the music-buying public of the gaping chasm which inevitably exists between your current and former self?
Hall's baby-faced look has actually stood up pretty well to the advancing years, and the new version of Gangsters on the Pistols' Speakers and Tweeters album, out in March, is nice enough in a not-very-different-to-the-original kind of way. Far worse was the sight of rotund 40-something Boy George "duetting" with himself on the BBC's imaginatively titled Duet Impossible show over Christmas.
Can you name any other artists (indeed, any at all) who have effectively covered themselves? And is this simply a good way of bringing the music to a new, younger audience, or is it a cop out by has-beens trading on their more salubrious pasts? Your thoughts and knowledge please.
