Mercy EP

Tri-Sound  www.myspace.com/trisoundmyspace

Hearing this stunned me, I will admit. Of course, the Duffy single of this song was played to death everywhere and is still heard everywhere. I don’t much like Duffy’s voice but her cut was a good party dance track,  guess.

But what this crew do is take the Duffy/Steve Booker composition and perform it like a vintage soul gem with a fantastic horn section and whomping beat, also what to my ears is a more plaintive and less stylised lead vocal.  They say it’s ‘what Mark Ronson would have done and what Duffy should have done’ which accounts for their approach. The record sounds like a classic jukebox 45, the type that Northern Soul nutjobs pay hundreds of pounds for providing only five were pressed, of course. At times the track sounds as though it’s heading into a medley with Mel Torme’s ‘Coming Home Baby’ or ‘Spencer Davis Group’s ‘I’m A Man’…

On this three-tracker, you get the new(‘old’) version of ‘Mercy’ plus an instrumental and then a Greg Wilson Extended Mix, all produced by Sir Tristan Longworth. Party cut of the year !

Pete Sargeant    www.fairhearing.co.uk