It's not hard to imagine hearing Nico's low register and ineffable sadness over a less extravagant combination of instruments on "These Days". This could well have been another coffeehouse folk song about day-to-day drudgery and the disappearance of passion-- especially because those damn strings, skipping around and over the delicate guitar, weren't supposed to be there in the first place. Producer Tom Wilson added them after the recording, much to the chagrin of Nico, who later called its parent album, Chelsea Girl, "unlistenable." Psssht. The grandeur of her melancholy is less restrained when there's a viola chipping away at the melody, but there's no gussying up or glossing over the punishing closing sentiment, perhaps an acknowledgement of the chanteuse's already intense heroin addiction: "Please don't confront me with my failures/ I had not forgotten them."
(Sean Fennessey about Nico's version)
An unusual and quite wonderful rarity on 2002's I'm No Angel, Jackson Browne's "These Days" highlights Gregg Allman's tie to folk music forms. Cast in his usual blues-based forms, Allman takes the sincerity and poetry of the youthful, coming-of-age message to heart, and it works wonders. Previously recorded by Nico, of all people, the song has an ageless quality to it, and when Allman adds his jazz-based organ solo to the arrangement, the final effect is pure magic. Perhaps not the definitive version of the song, it nevertheless remains a unique and emotional reading.
(Matthew Greenwald, allmusic.com, about Greg Allman's version) |
