Mark Ronson: Stop Me

December 4th, 2007

Mark Ronson & Daniel Merriweather

So yesterday when Jen and I were watching The Hills, the soundtrack for the episode was great, as usual. And mercifully, no Sean Kingston plugs in sight this time around (although they did sneak in an actual Sean Kingston commercial), I heard this GREAT song playing in the background of one of the scenes, and I was immediately singing along. Like, to every lyric. Yet I’d never heard the song. So it was obviously a cover, but sounded very different from whatever the original was, because I generally don’t listen whatever this genre of music was…it sounded like the soulful vocals of perhaps Cee-Lo (Gnarls Barkley) or Cody Chesnutt.

But it was in fact Daniel Merriweather, who is white & Australian. And the song in question is Stop Me, and it’s on Mark Ronson‘s 2007 album Version.

And it is in fact a danceable cover of brilliant 1987 song Stop Me If You Think That You’ve Heard This Song Before by The Smiths, who naturally fking rule. I mean, come on, Morrissey…could these lyrics be any more brilliant?

I smelled the last ten seconds of life
I crashed down on the crossbar
And the pain was enough to make
A shy, bald, buddhist reflect
And plan a mass murder

Like, come on. Anyhoodle, twenty years on is a great time to rework the song the way Mark Ronson did.

Interestingly, towards the end of the song there are additional lyrics (Set me free why don’t ya babe / get outta my life why don’t you / Cause you don’t really love me / you just keep me hangin’ on) are from a 1966 song by The Supremes called You Keep Me Hangin’ On that was covered by Kim Wilde exactly twenty years later in 1986. The song became a massive 80s hit.

Watch all four videos below…but especially check out the reworked Stop Me. It’s a fun video.

Links:
MySpace: Daniel Merriweather
MySpace: Mark Ronson

Video: Mark Ronson – Stop Me
Video: The Smiths – Stop Me If You Think That You’ve Heard This One Before
Video: The Supremes – You Keep Me Hangin’ On
Video: Kim Wilde – You Keep Me Hangin’ On

Photograph Courtesy Getty Images

Posted on Tuesday, December 4th, 2007 at 2:12 pm by Alison and is filed under Music & Videos.