Canadian singer-songwriter Bryan Adams has recently released an album of covers on the Verve label. It’s his first studio album since 2008 and features a mix of reworked classics. The album’s title “Tracks Of My Years” indicates the songs are reflective of his influences. In the liner notes, however, a forward from Bryan states that producer David Foster’s criteria was that the songs had to have been top 10 hits in the USA. That criteria may account for the unexpected song selection. The CD itself is stamped to look like an old 45 RPM vinyl record and the packaging hallmarks a photograph of Bryan Adams when he was 16 years old. The album includes 10 cover songs and one original, “She Knows Me,” written by Adams and long time cohort Jim Vallance. With a career spanning more than 35 years, selecting just 10 tracks must have been quite a task.
The album begins with an interesting arrangement of The Beatles “Any Time At All.” I like the instrumentation on this one. It’s different, but still immediately recognizable. Bryan Adams was able to take this tried and true classic and make it his own. He followed it up with the original and lyrically strong “She Knows Me.”
Adams captured the lounge essence of Rod Stewart’s ‘The Great American Songbook’ with his version of “I Can’t Stop Loving You” (written by Don Gibson but also a Ray Charles hit). It has a bluesy/gospel flavor but vocally, he doesn’t own this one. He sounds more like Rod Stewart than himself in a karaoke kind of way. The same Stewart lounge sound holds true for John Fogerty’s “Down on the Corner” and Brian Wilson’s “God Only Knows.”
Chuck Berry’s “Rock and Roll Music” is my favorite track on this album. It’s true to form and fun. He does Chuck justice on this cover. I also enjoyed Adams’ rendition of Bob Dylan’s “Lay Lady Lay” with its recurring countrified steel guitar riff. While “Tracks Of My Years” encompasses the R&B, rock, pop and country genres, I prefer his original hits. This album is certainly not a definitive representation of the artist. Bryan Adams has developed his very own signature sound and in my opinion, he does his own music best.
