Brian Eno is MORE DARK THAN SHARK

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The Telegraph JANUARY 3, 2015 - by Michael Henderson

BASSEY'S BEATLES BEATS COCKER'S EVERY TIME

Fraser Nelson, The Spectator editor and Telegraph columnist, really put a C among the Ps, as Wodehouse might have said, when he wrote that the late Joe Cocker's cover of With A Little Help From My Friends was the only time a singer had improved a Beatles song.

Hmm. Cocker's emotional bleating and yelping never sounded convincing to these ears. But Shirley Bassey's Something really works, with the Welsh belter throwing some paprika into the pot and giving it a good stir.

Billy J Kramer's From A Window and It's Only Love, by Gary "US" Bonds, are other examples. But the best may well be Tomorrow Never Knows, performed by 801, a pick-up band led by Brian Eno: Lennon's hippy-dippy song is transformed by Phil Manzanera's guitar and Eno's fruity Home Counties enunciation. Think again, "Groover" Nelson!