Songstress Marianne Faithfull last collaborated with producer Hal Willner on her iconic Strange Weather album in 1987 and the match also feels effortless and natural here. Like Strange Weather, Easy Come Easy Go is a covers collection, featuring Faithfull in different musical settings and interpreting the songs of everyone from Merle Haggard to Smokey Robinson to Duke Ellington to Randy Newman to the Decemberists to Morrissey with a killer guest list including Antony Hegarty, Rufus Wainwright, Teddy Thompson, Kate & Anna McGarrigle, Jarvis Cocker, Jenni Muldaur, Sean Lennon, Warren Ellis, Nick Cave, and Keith Richards. The core band on this set includes old friends like Marc Ribot and Greg Cohen as well as drummer Jim White, Rob Burger, Doug Weiselman, Steve Weisberg, Barry Reynolds, Steven Bernstein, Marty Ehrlich, and Lenny Pickett. The sense of stylistic sprawl on these 12 songs is incredible. For example, the album opener, a cover of Dolly Parton’s “Down from Dover,” features the full band and guests numbering 18 strong! Faithfull’s trademark deep-throated, whiskey-and-cigarettes-ravaged voice shows up in excellent form and take you on journeys through love, lust, tragedy, and longing and bring you home again. This reissue is a special one with a white coloured 180g double vinyl edition.
