Clare Teal: Chasing Cars (From The Northern Echo)

Clare Teal: Chasing Cars

4:32pm Thursday 21st July 2011 in Singles

FOR all I tried to remove those rose-tinted specs and give the girl a fair hearing, I could not get away from the fact that this was too big a hit the first time around.

I could therefore be being completely biased in this, but even if I wasn’t a huge Snow Patrol fan, I can’t help thinking that to pull off a good cover, you need a new gimmick, a whole new perspective.

A complete contrast is better than a bad match and I’m afraid that this was the latter. Teal, who forged her career in the North-East, has a great voice and is, obviously, an aspiring star, but I fear this is not the correct route.

It may have worked better in ten years’ time, but with the ink hardly dry on the songsheet, we’ve not even had a chance to forget how amazing the original was.

A bit of advice for you Clare, if you must copy someone else’s song, try and be more imaginative and put your own stamp on it.