Patti Smith gave me a compliment ... and a row
THE first time Eddi Reader sat down to listen to her album of the songs of Robert Burns, things were a little hazy.
“I was still heavily partying in those days, so I was stoned. I remember thinking My Love Is Like A Red Red Rose is just too beautiful – everybody is going to laugh at me,” she recalled.
“I got this paranoid sense I’d somehow got it all wrong. I was dabbling in stuff that didn’t suit me. Then, when I got sober, I listened to it once through with my husband John. I think it worked.
“I left it behind me then. I only revisited it when I made the deluxe version in 2012 and added some new songs to it. By then, the album had been accepted. Everybody seemed to love it and by that time, I loved it too.”
Eddi has fond memories of when she premiered the record with two triumphant shows at the Royal Concert Hall in Glasgow.
She performed Burns’s songs with her band and the RSNO, led by Kevin McCrae.
“Kevin was standing, baton ready, and I started the song in the wrong key,” she said.
“All my pals were saying ‘Edna’s f***** up!’ Behind me, I could feel all this turmoil. But nobody wanted to say what are you doing?’ The whole audience was laughing. But that broke the ice, and from then on it was great. A very natural thing happened which was that my scatty heid came in to save us all from the freaked outness we were in.”
Eddi had also performed with the RSNO at the Burns An’ A’ That festival staged in Culzean Castle in Ayrshire.
She shared the spotlight with Patti Smith, who is also a Burns aficionado.
The queen of New York punk had some very kind words for the Scottish singer.
“I was in the green room when she walked up to me – it was like seeing an angel,” Eddi recalled.
“She told me my version of John Anderson My Jo brought back memories of her late husband.
“She said: ‘I just wanna tell you, that song you did, John Anderson My Jo – it reminds me of Fred. And I love it. I think it’s the best thing I’ve ever heard.
“I said: ‘Oh, thank you very much’. “She replied: ‘And, I’m not bull******** you’. She gave me into a row straight away for getting all frothy with her.”