It’s pretty obvious I’m obsessed with duets right now. I’ve been pretty deep into Rowland S. Howard‘s library this past month and two of my favorite songs are made totally sexy and beyond cool by Lydia Lunch and Jonnine Standish.
In 1982, Lydia Lunch and Rowland S. Howard released a single that included “Some Velvet Morning” (previously recorded by Lee Hazelwood and Nancy Sinatra) and “I Fell in Love with a Ghost.” Their version of “Some Velvet Morning” is romantic but in a slightly more goth way than the original version. While Rowland S. Howard and Lydia Lunch capture the basic vibe, they take the song and exaggerate the disjointed feeling. It feels more like a broken music box than a romantic soundtrack for a movie. Lydia Lunch’s voice captures the innocence of Nancy Sinatra but more in a haunted child kind of way. Lydia Lunch and Rowland S. Howard went on to collaborate on many other projects after this such as Honeymoon in Red (1987) and Shotgun Wedding (1991).
The other duet is “(I Know) A Girl Called Jonny” which appeared on Rowland S. Howard’s final album in 2009, Pop Crimes. The duet is with Jonnine Standish of Australian band HTRK. The song is all about Jonnine (“Jonny bangs the drums”), as she plays percussion in HTRK. The lyrics involve a lot of gender bending which makes for a sexy. Unfortunately, Rowland S. Howard died about two months after the album release.
**If you missed the 2014 interview we did with Lydia Lunch, you can access it here.
