Friday, January 12, 2024

Little Things Mean a Lot - Bettye Swann

Little Things Mean a Lot - Bettye Swann
3:43
Don't You Ever Get Tired Of Hurting Me?, 1969
Written by Edith Lindeman and Carl Stutz, 1953

Recorded when Swann was just nineteen, this is a slow-burning soul song, a plea for attention that's packed with emotion.  The songs starts with Swann's delicate vocal, with the band a gentle accompaniment: "Blow me a kiss from across the room / Tell me I look nice even when I'm not / Touch my hair as you pass my chair / These are just little things, oh but they mean a lot." These gestures are mere tokens, but that's what gives the request its emotional power.  Gradually, dreamy backing vocals and horns build and build to a crescendo, and Swann's voice is longing, not overwrought but impassioned, until at the end it falls to a whispered plea again.  The delicate, intimate production has been cited as an inspiration for Aretha Franklin.

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