Adele sees the largest Grammy bounce in the award show's 54-year history

[john]

While she was touring North America in support of 19, Adele was introduced by her bus driver to a Wanda Jackson greatest hits album. As she traveled round the Southern states, she found herself drawn to American Country music, including Alison Krauss, Rascal Flatts and Lady Antebellum. Once she began prepping her sophomore release back in England, Adele began incorporating those new influences into songs, like this one where her voice incorporates in part Jackson's dirty-blues growl. "I wanted the songs not to have anything glittery or glamorous about them, like an organic tapestry rather than like a Gaga album," the singer told Rolling Stone. "I mean, I love Gaga, but I didn't want to get wrapped up in all that European dance music."

Earlier today I was looking to see how long it took RITD to reach #1 in the U.S. (released December, #1 in May) in response to comments that the song was an immediate hit. Not quite - it didn't hit #1 until Haley covered it . But I also ran into references to Wanda Jackson, an influence on Adele, as well as the Beatles and others. I soon found myself listening to stuff like Mean, Mean Man from 1960 and Hard Headed Woman:



And the 1956 song, Wasted. ....of all things, includes the lyric, wasted tears among other things:
Wasted lonely nights, wasted times I cry
Wasted a love so true, I've wasted all the love I had for you
Wasted a lovin' heart, my hands were tied right from the start
Your carefree heart will never see just what this wasted love has done to me
It's made me cry, it's made me lonely, it makes me sad why love's disarrayed
Wasted years and years, wasted tears and tears
Wasted love that was to be, now all I have is wasted memory
It's made me cry...

Touted as the Queen of Rockabilly, singer Wanda Jackson was the first woman to sing in a seductive, growling rock 'n' roll style. Jackson was discovered by country and western singer Hank Thompson in 1954 at age 17, recording her first country hit "You Can't Have My Love" with his band. A year later, she briefly dated a then-unknown Elvis Presley, who told her that she should start singing rock 'n' roll. In 1956, she took his advice and hit the Top 20 country charts with the rocked up "I Gotta Know." The following year, she recorded the smoking "Fujiyama Mama," which hit number one in Japan despite the opening verse: "I been to Nagasaki, Hiroshima too. The things I did to them, baby, I can do to you!" The sexuality of Elvis that had shaken up America appeared tame compared to Jackson's sizzling style.

http://www.bwcitypaper.com/Articles-i-20...ckson.html

She was inducted into the Rock and Rock Hall of Fame in 2009.  Bob Dylan, called her "An atomic bomb in lipstick." I have to post one more, the not so PC Fujiyama Mama.


In 2010 she recorded Amy Winehouse'sYou Know I'm No Good. LOL.

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Whadaboutluv on IF commented that Haley's Wasted Tears had shades of Roy Orbison/Traveling Wilburys (You Got It). I hear some of that. (Sidebar: Haley could cover stuff like Blue Bijou quite nicely).