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Watching the recent “80′s Week” episode of America’s Best Dance Crew, I was reminded of how great the music from the Footloose soundtrack is. Then EW Magazine pointed me in the direction of Thomas Barlett (aka Doveman), a 26-year old New York-based musician who has oddly never seen Footloose, but has done an amazing thing: recorded the whole soundtrack, stripped-down and haunting.

At first I thought it was a bit cheesy, but then I heard the backstory. Here’s what Bartlett’s childhood best friend, Gabriel Greenberg, had to say:

When I was very young, my half-sister Jenny died tragically. She was a teenager, and it was the 80′s. She left behind a wardrobe of brightly colored clothes, rainbow stickers, life-size paintings, doodles on lined paper, and hundreds of tapes. These constitute most of my memories of her. It’s sad for me to look at these things, and usually I don’t. But a couple of summers ago I found a tape of hers with a startling cover photograph – this was Footloose. I couldn’t stop listening: it was a portrait of 80′s love, desire, pain, freedom, and frenzy; of being a teenager in a time of change. By listening, I could step into Jenny’s shoes, see things from her vantage point. I could be emancipated by rock and roll and walkmen, just as she had been. We could listen together.

I asked my friend Thomas to cover the album, which, sheltered as he is, he had never heard before. I was clear that I wanted him to cover the whole album – the point wasn’t to rework any one song, but to re-imagine the picture they made together. With a new Footloose we could reply to the past, tell our own story about being young. This is what he made.

And now I can’t. stop. listening. My favourites: Almost Paradise, Holding Out For A Hero, and Somebody’s Eyes.

Amazing.

Listen for yourself at www.dovemanmusic.com.

Posted on Tuesday, August 12th, 2008 at 2:06 pm by Soja and is filed under Music & Videos.

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