Goodbye old Silver Spurs

Duos. A very hit-or-miss affair, generally. Renee and Renata - bad. Kylie and Cave - inexplicably good. Winehouse and Church - let's not go there. Then there's Nancy and Lee, without a shadow of a doubt the best and most menacing/kitsch/beguiling duo ever. The strawberries and cherries and an angel's kiss in spring of Frank JR and Mr Hazlewood's evil 'some velvet morning when I'm straaaaaight' worked great and set a lineage in place that continues to this day with Richard Hawley and the Tindersticks. Apparently, Hazlewood was once punched out by Sinatra senior after telling Nancy to sing These Boots Are Made For Walking "like a 16-year old girl who fucks truck drivers". He then made bizarre solo albums in Sweden, became a really notorious old cuss, smoking and boozing and brawling and then, knowing he was dying, he released Cake Or Death last year as a finale. It was, by and large, bobbins. Remember him instead for Some Velvet Morning, Summer Wine, Ladybird and I Move Around, with their laconic drunkeredness and Billy Strange orchestration. Oh, and read this obit. RIP Lee, you grizzled old trooper.

Listen to Some Velvet Morning