Today I want to share a great cover version of “Beautiful James“ with you. It was recorded by Special G, a band from Moscow, Russia, that was founded in summer 2013.
After the split up of his former group Special G guitarist Dmitry Kryukov surfed some music forums to search for a new singer, preferentally one who was experienced in English, and found Alex Riot's profile. Dmitry: “I immediately realized that this was my chance because a vocalist with this level of vocal skills and really good English pronunciation is rare in Russian musicians community. The similarity with Brian Molko wasn't the main reason, to be honest.”
So he decided to start a band with Alex as soon as possible. They were joined by two musicians of Dmitry's previous combo, Roman Kashitsyn (bass) and Dmitry Linnik (drums).
”When we first played together we didn't really know where to start“, Alex concedes. ”So, because of the specifics of my voice, we decided to cover a few Placebo songs.“
They recorded some videos and put them on Youtube, and this is how their manager finally found the band.
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| Photo credit: Special G |
Quite a few of you may think that Special G is somehow related to the song “Special K“, but you're miles out! Alex explains: “When we played our first gig we did not have a name yet. So our manager decided to announce us as Special Guest, shortly Special G. And the name remained.“
By the way: If you're located in or near Moscow you should definitely jump at the chance and see the band at their next live show on February 6th.
More info about the concert: ๐
https://bit.ly/3FyQCLw Tickets: ๐
https://bit.ly/3zZfL0T  |
Photo credit: Special G
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Special G are often referred to as the Russian Placebo, but actually none of the band members was a big Placebo fan from the beginning. They only knew the big hits like “Every you Every me”, “Meds”, “Pure morning” and some others. “I've started to discover Placebo through covering them and I realized that there are real jewels deep inside the albums and b-sides”, Dmitry admits. He continues that he could list many songs now, but wants to mention some aesthetically wonderful arranged ones from the early albums: “Lady of the flowers“, “Ask for answers“, “The Crawl“, “Narcoleptic“ and “Leni”. “They are absolutely beautiful songs, the melodies, harmonies, arrangements and sounds that are used in them are really unique and it's hard to find many other bands who did something like that.”
Alex' story is similar. He listened to a lot of different music and Placebo was not his favorite band at all, but he was told so often that his voice sounds very much like Brian's that he finally tried it out and sang some of their songs. “And then, through playing and singing, I felt that there was something special about them. Something magical, something sublime, something strange. And I love that.”
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| Photo credit: Special G |
But there's something that is even better for Alex Riot: Playing his own songs. ”It's a pure orgasm for me”. Below you can check out a sample of how that sounds.
๐น SPECIAL G – LIAR๐ต
https://bit.ly/3nseWbO ๐ต
“Liar” was written when the singer lived in Italy. “I was 19 and I realized how many times people are used to lie. They find comfort in their lies, and so do I. Actually I don't want to be like that and I’m (unsuccessfully) trying to always say the truth.” Back in Russia Alex and the “Specials” rearranged the song and recorded the shared demo in 2015.
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| Photo credit: Special G |
Now back to “Beautiful James“: It's hard to believe but recording the cover version started off as a kind of joke. Dmitry: ”I was just noodling with my guitar when we listened to it and accidentally I found a similarity to a riff from ”Without you I'm nothing”. If you slightly change the first chord it can be adapted to “Beautiful James”, you only need to find a right rhythm pattern. Also we decided to change the atmosphere and feeling of the song and play it more acoustic and live, not so robotic and synthesized like the original track.”
At the moment Special G are working on new material. Several singles will be released in the near future. So stay tuned, soulmates, and check out the pages below from time to time!
More about Special G:
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https://vk.com/specialg๐
https://www.instagram.com/specialg_band/ Post by Silke
