“You Can Call Me Al” — Rough Island Band
The most notable things about “You Can Call Me Al” are its goofy music video and palindromic slap-bass solo. More interesting is the story of the Rough Island Band, who hail from from the Isles of Scilly, an outlying archipelago off the southwest tip of Britain. They recorded this terrific cover on St. Agnes, “a tiny scrap of wind-carved rock, gorsey downland and fine sand” home to only 80 inhabitants. Banjo and melodia are a fine replacement for the blaring keyboards and bongo drums of the original.
