You Electrify Me...
 ©2008 Belltown Records, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
"Another
cover, but this one written by mid-Missouri songwriting legend, Lee
Ruth. We were invited to choose one of Lee's songs for a KOPN
(Columbia's community radio station) tribute CD where regional
musicians were to cover his songs, and proceeds from sales of the CD
would go to benefit the station. I, for one, being relatively new to
the area, was incredibly honored to be asked. I will never forget
two stories surrounding the way in which I chose this song, and
Lee's reaction to my arrangement of it. When Lee brought me some of
the songs that hadn't yet been chosen by other artists, he
'apologized' for the selection by saying 'it's sort of the bottom of
my song bag.' All I could think, upon hearing You Electrify Me, was:
"if this is the bottom of his song bag....what must the TOP be
like?" In truth, Lee seems incapable of writing anything but quality
music. I felt inspired to cover this song because the chorus is pure
love song at its wittiest. I, in my usual style, expanded the song
quite a bit. Hearing Lee perform it a year or so after we recorded
it for the tribute CD, he remarked, "no matter how hard I try, I can
never seem to get this song to last more than a minute and thirty
seconds." This was of course in reference to our much longer
version. I added a violin melody which has become sort of a
trademark of our arrangement, and the band felt that the song would
sound great with a Caribbean feel - they were right! Invariably,
people get up and dance to this one at live shows. The version that
appears on Road to Hope is true to how we perform it now after
months of fine-tuning it in live performance." |
 You Electrify Me
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