Song: Valerie
Artists: Mark Ronson (featuring Amy Winehouse)
Original artists: Zutons
English indie band the Zutons recorded Valerie in 2006 and it was covered the following
year by Mark Ronson with Amy Winehouse on vocals.
In the UK the original peaked at No 9 while the follow-up achieved greater success
hitting No 2.
Zutons lead singer Dave McCabe confessed that the song was written in fairly
uninspiring circumstances – a 20 minute taxi ride to his mother’s house.
However, the inspiration for it held slightly more interest. It was prompted by the band
discovering that an American friend, celebrity make-up artist Valerie Star, had been
arrested for a driving offence.
The song was used by the ITV channel for its coverage of the 2006 World Cup finals.
Ronson and Winehouse covered the song for Ronson’s second studio album, Version,
in 2007. The Rolling Stone magazine declared it to be Winehouse’s only “notable
recording” after Back to Black.
The duo’s version was the ninth biggest selling single in the UK that year. It total, over
two spells, it spent 39 weeks in the UK charts.
There have been numerous other cover versions down the ensuing years including one
by another Ronson collaborator – Bruno Mars – who performed it at the 2011 MTV
Video Music awards.
The song should not be confused with the song Valerie by Stevie Winwood (one of my
personal favourites) which was itself covered by Eric Prydz under the title of Call on Me
(great video, by the way) with the name Valerie dropped totally. Maybe he felt its
inclusion would only cause a mix up. I will address Winwood and Prydz versions in my
next blog.
