Certainly not everything that Samantha Sidley sings – after all she claims Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday as influences – would turn up on Americana UK, but we’re happy to have this cover of Ry Cooder’s song to feature today. With rolling drums and almost-mariachi trumpets it gets into that dusty corner of desert rock Americana, Howe Gelb territory if you will.
It’s a song that came to Samantha Sidley in a suitable way “I heard ‘Drive like I never been Hurt’ for the first time on a long drive out of town. One of my favorite places to listen to music is on a long drive. It got stuck in my head and I wanted to listen to it all the time. I felt I needed to sing it. It was something I needed to talk about. This song to me is about saying ‘f*** you’ to all and any oppressive obstacles life throws at you. You don’t forget pain, but you learn to accept and move through it. Sometimes that feels like you are driving down the road in a convertible, tears streaming down your face, you don’t even know where you are headed but that doesn’t matter. You trust the destination. Even when you can’t see it.”
Photograph: Claire Marie Vogel
