Ok, don't talk to me, you gotta blame Jani for this one (tail end of the Friday Farce Jerusalem saga -- you cans follow it back in time):

Bruce Dickinson - Jerusalem (feat. Arthur Brown) (4.56 MB mp3: right-click and Save As to download; play using the handy little embedded player below)

Bruce Dickinson is of course the singer in Iron Maiden, not that that has stopped him from over the years making a bunch of albums on his own. This version of Jerusalem --not exactly a cover, more a re-setting of the William Blake poem to different music again -- is from his 1998 album The Chemical Wedding.

The spoken-word part at the end is performed by Arthur Brown. Yep, you heard me right, THE Arthur Brown.

He of the Crazy World of Arthur Brown. He of the theatrical performances. He of the outlandish costumes and helmets of fire. He of the demented, fire-obsessed lyrical visions and swooping, theatrical vocals:

One of the most electrifying one-shot artists of the '60s, British singer Arthur Brown briefly set the charts alight in 1968, and his debut album was surely one of the most left-field commercial successes of the late '60s, if not of rock history...

Here's his signature tune Fire, as well as the maniacal cover of Screaming Jay Hawkins' I Put A Spell On You which appeared on the same album.

The Crazy World of Arthur Brown - Fire (2.12 MB mp3)

The Crazy World of Arthur Brown - I Put A Spell On You (2.79 MB mp3)

Labels: Friday farce, music