Rhino’s Got You Covered: Dave Edmunds, The Searchers, Carlene Carter, and The Staples

It’s Wednesday, so it must be time to take another dip into the Rhino catalog and trot out a new quartet of cover songs that you may or may not have heard before. Let’s get started, shall we?

•    Dave Edmunds, “Heart of the City” (1978): Given that Edmunds and Lowe were both members of Brinsley Schwartz, it wasn’t exactly a stunner that Lowe – who was a notoriously prolific songwriter back in the day – would pass along a track or two for Edmunds to tackle, but this is probably the one that’s most associated with Lowe himself.

•    The Searchers, “Hearts in Her Eyes” (1979): Yes, this is the same ‘60s band that made a name for itself with “Needles and Pins,” but they took a valiant stab at reinventing themselves for a new generation with their self-titled 1979 album. In addition to this Records song, they also covered “Switchboard Susan,” Tom Petty’s “Lost in Your Eyes,” and several other songs by more contemporary tunesmiths. As for this video, we can only tell you that we don’t know what the guy on the right of the screen is doing, either, but we couldn’t take our eyes off of him.

•    Carlene Carter, “Radio Sweetheart” (1979): It would’ve been a little too predictable to include a Carter cover of a Nick Lowe song, what with them having been married and everything, so we thought we’d go with her take on this classic Elvis Costello song instead.

•    The Staples, “Showdown” (1978): Any ELO apologist who wants to keep on claiming that Jeff Lynne and company weren’t writing disco music should probably stay away from this cover by the members of the Staples family, because they mind have their mind expanded, and after this many years, we’re not sure they could handle it.