democracy wins: derek webb covers the swell season’s ‘falling slowly’

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Tuesday, December 13th, 2011

derek webb democracy volume 2

democracy wins: derek webb covers the swell season’s ‘falling slowly’

EDITORIAL NOTE :: a while back, i had a brief (but positive) twitter exchange with derek webb. much to my surprise, it seems he has kept up with this democracy wins blog series. while he was appreciative of my reviews and support, he expressed concern over the lack of a call to action, if you will, for the reader/listener to go purchase the collection of songs. here was one of his tweets:

http://twitter.com/#!/derekwebb/status/114355620248948736

so, please allow me direct you to derek’s store where you can purchase the album. it’s only $5, which is a ridiculously low price for this collection. the other great thing about purchasing right now is that you don’t have to wait 30 days for the next track (at least for the preceding 9 tracks). 🙂

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if you’d like to take a look back at 2010’s democracy vol. 1, you can find all those posts through the following links:

january | february | march | april | may | june | july | august | september | october | november | december

throughout the year, i’ve been blogging about derek webb’s ongoing project called democracy vol. 2. fans were able to cast votes for up to 10 songs that they wanted webb to cover. then, the 10 songs receiving the most votes would be covered by webb for the album. the collection is being recorded over the span of 2011, with 1 track being recorded and released each month. from march to december, webb has/will release 1 track each month. for those who would like to catch up, here’s links to each month’s blog posts so far:

1. cee lo green: f**k you
2. bon jovi: livin’ on a prayer
3. the beach boys: god only knows
4. u2: one
5. traditional: be thou my vision
6. simon & garfunkel: bridge over troubled water
7. the beatles: revolution
8. rich mullins: creed

today, we found out november’s track (better late than never, right?): the swell season’s falling slowly.

i was glad to see this track not only because i voted (originally, in 2010) for this track, but i thought it would be a cool way to get his wife, sandra mccracken, involved once again with this project. well, we didn’t get sandra, but i’m glad to report that his solo rendition of falling slowly is a successful addition to democracy vol. 2.

as we’ve come to expect, webb gives it his own mark, rather than simply duplicating the original effort. with this version, he’s sped it up considerably, to the point where the song isn’t immediately recognizable. his version is driven by a pulsating downbeat and an added whimsy actually has a little bit of an arcade fire flare. all in all, it’s a great cover of a song that was previously great.

as always, don’t take my word for it. check it out for yourself. you can purchase the entire collection by clicking here or you can listen to it here.