Today’s remake preview no.4 is the inimitable Wallis Bird’s wonderful version of ‘Air At The Top’Air At The Top’ remade at Wallis’s home in Berlin.
Wallis and I became pen pals long before we met. We started exchanging demos and songs, and over a few years a friendship grew. We have only met once, but it was like meeting an old and trusted friend. I watched transfixed as she performed a rare solo set in London to a rapt audience who sang along to every word. When she performed an encore, unplugged and standing in the middle of the crowd, I remember thinking, this is how you change peoples lives. To anyone who has heard Wallis’s music, you will know that singular voice and what a amazingly powerful and optimistic energy she brings to everything she does. It was so touched when Wallis said she wanted to be a part of the Remakes project and her version of ‘Air At The Top’ is very special indeed – not just because she has taken it off the piano an onto the guitar, but because she finds in it, something I could never have found myself. And isn’t the whole point?
‘I believe that we could be better,
I believe that we could be friends,
I believe we should keep on believing
That the story’s not over till it ends
I believe that eventually we’ll succeed
In being what we could be, and not what we are’
You can find out more about Wallis’s fantastic music, her latest album ‘Seven Years of Wallis Bird 2007 – 2014’ is out now, at her website:
www.wallisbird.com