Dear listeners,
Last week, when I shared a 13-track playlist of some of my favorite Beatles covers by Black musicians, I included a note asking you to let me know if I’d left off your favorite. I expected some responses — but the volume, variety and passion of your recommendations blew me away. So much so that I decided to make a sequel playlist, made up entirely of readers’ picks.
You’ll hear from soul stars (Otis Redding, Donny Hathaway) and jazz legends (Ella Fitzgerald, Wes Montgomery). You’ll hear a whole suite of live tracks that will make you feel like you’re at an exceptionally awesome Beatles tribute concert. And you’ll also hear from Amplifier readers, in their own words, explaining why they chose these covers.
The sheer breadth of your picks reflects just how often Beatles songs have been reworked, reinvented and reimagined by Black artists from different genres. But there was definitely one cover that got mentioned in your messages more frequently than all the rest. If you make it all the way through this playlist to its final track, you’ll know which one I’m talking about.
Take a sad song and make it better,
Lindsay
Listen along while you read.
1. Richie Havens: “Here Comes the Sun”
We begin with a cover that many of you thought was a grievous omission from my list, Richie Havens’s warm, insistently strummed reimagining of “Here Comes the Sun.” Though Havens didn’t play this song during his famous opening set at Woodstock in August 1969, he did three other Beatles covers that day: “With a Little Help From My Friends,” “Strawberry Fields Forever” and “Hey Jude.”
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
2. Little Richard: “I Saw Her Standing There”
The rock pioneer (and Beatles influence) Little Richard rips through this early Lennon-McCartney composition for the grand finale of his 1970 comeback album, “The Rill Thing.” According to Kevin Rodgers, one of the readers who suggested it, “He absolutely owns it, and THAT is a backbeat!”
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
3. Otis Redding: “Day Tripper (Live in Europe)”
On some of his greatest covers — see also: the soul exorcism that is his version of the Stones’ “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” — Otis Redding knew how to tear a song to pieces while still honoring the original in the distinct, highly personalized way he put those pieces back together. The Amplifier reader Stu Hackel sent this one my way, though he specified that this live version is even better than the studio recording — and I have to agree!
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
4. Sylvester: “Blackbird (Live in San Francisco)”
I wasn’t familiar with this cover of “Blackbird” by the disco legend Sylvester until a few readers recommended it, but it is indeed transcendent. Recorded live at the San Francisco Opera House, it features ecstatic backing vocals from Martha Wash and Izora Armstead — then known as Two Tons of Fun, but later as the Weather Girls, the duo who recorded “It’s Raining Men.”
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
5. Donny Hathaway: “Yesterday”
Donny Hathaway clearly had an affinity for the Beatles, as evidenced by his gorgeous 1972 cover of John Lennon’s solo hit “Jealous Guy.” But until the Amplifier reader Robin Diaz sent this one along, I didn’t know that Hathaway also did a stunning rendition of this Paul McCartney ballad, released on the posthumous live compilation “These Songs for You, Live!” I love the audience response on this recording, and how you can tell they’re hanging on his every word.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
6. Ella Fitzgerald: “Can’t Buy Me Love”
Here’s a winning strategy for recording a Beatles cover: Get George Martin to handle the musical arrangement. That’s what the great Ella Fitzgerald did in early 1964 when she cut this jazzy take on the Beatles single that was then dominating the airwaves, a track that made her — as the Amplifier reader David Berman pointed out to me — the first major artist to score a hit with a Beatles cover. Fitzgerald also sang this song on (where else?) “The Ed Sullivan Show” in 1968.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
7. Esther Phillips: “And I Love Him”
Bill Carpenter suggested I check out this sweet, gender-flipped 1965 rendition of “And I Love Her” by the R&B singer Esther Phillips. Another fan of it? McCartney, who mentioned it when he was asked in a 2018 interview to name some of his favorite Beatles covers.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
8. Luther Vandross: “Michelle (Studio Mix)”
This sumptuous Luther Vandross interpretation of a “Rubber Soul” ballad was recorded in 1989 but nearly lost to time until many years later, when Vandross’s friend and backing singer Fonzi Thornton stumbled upon a cassette recording of it in the late singer’s archives. (It was later released for the first time on the 2024 Vandross collection “Never Too Much: Greatest Hits.”) I hadn’t heard it before, and I tip my hat to Leisa Chester Weir for telling me about it.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
9. Wes Montgomery: “Eleanor Rigby”
The jazz guitarist Wes Montgomery got quite a few mentions from readers, especially for the title track of his 1967 album “A Day in the Life.” But Teri Williams recommended that album’s other Beatles cover, because it was a favorite of her mother. “My mom passed away 25 years ago,” she wrote, “but I still carry a memory of growing up with that cover.”
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
10. Dionne Farris: “Blackbird”
Another take on “Blackbird”? Why not! David Lerner recommended one that he thinks “tends to fly under the radar,” from the R&B singer-songwriter Dionne Farris. (“Dionne’s version always makes me bob my head with an appreciative smile,” he wrote, “no matter how my day’s been going.”) This cover appears on Farris’s 1994 debut LP, “Wild Seed — Wild Flower,” which also featured her infectious and inescapable hit “I Know.”
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
11. Wilson Pickett: “Hey Jude”
Finally, while I was impressed by the sheer variety of covers that readers suggested, there was a clear and overwhelming consensus choice: Wilson Pickett’s 1969 cover — no, resurrection — of “Hey Jude,” featuring Duane Allman playing guitar so blisteringly that it prompted Eric Clapton to ask him to join Derek and the Dominos. (“This song is not only powerful in its performance by Pickett, but underscores a terrific example of racial unity among the creative community during a tumultuous time in this country’s history,” the Amplifier reader David Barclay wrote.) What can I say: I am human, and I simply forgot about this wonderful cover. As a penance, though, I played it on a jukebox this past weekend at a local bar, and I was delighted to see a guy pull out his phone to Shazam it. That’s how you know it’s a hit.
Listen on Spotify, Apple Music or YouTube
The Amplifier Playlist
“Readers Pick 11 (More) Transcendent Beatles Covers by Black Musicians” track list Track 1: Richie Havens, “Here Comes the Sun” Track 2: Little Richard, “I Saw Her Standing There” Track 3: Otis Redding, “Day Tripper (Live in Europe)” Track 4: Sylvester, “Blackbird (Live in San Francisco)” Track 5: Donny Hathaway, “Yesterday” Track 6: Ella Fitzgerald, “Can’t Buy Me Love” Track 7: Esther Phillips, “And I Love Him” Track 8: Luther Vandross, “Michelle (Studio Mix)” Track 9: Wes Montgomery, “Eleanor Rigby” Track 10: Dionne Farris, “Blackbird” Track 11: Wilson Pickett, “Hey Jude”
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Lindsay Zoladz is a pop music critic for The Times and writes the music newsletter The Amplifier.
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