Everything But The Girl have released a four-track EP recorded at Maida Vale studios.
Captured during the duo’s recent BBC radio session, it features takes on the tracks Run A Red Light, Single and When You Mess Up as heard on Gideon Coe’s BBC 6 Music show, and Nothing Left To Lose, which first aired on Jo Whiley’s BBC Radio 2 show.
All of the tracks except for Single appeared on ‘Fuse’ – Everything But The Girl’s first album in 24 years. Single originally featured on Tracey Thorn and Ben Watt’s 1996 album, ‘Walking Wounded’.
“It was exciting returning to such a famous studio to record these tracks,” says Tracey. “It was almost 40 years since our first John Peel Session there. The idea was to start by approaching all four as live piano and vocal takes.”
“Nothing Left To Lose was then left stripped back as a complete contrast to the original, while for the others we added a few one-take overdubs of synth, guitar, drums and backing vocals to capture both the spontaneity of a session but a flavour of the original album arrangements,” adds Ben.
In a review of the album, RETROPOP called Everything But The Girl’s comeback album ‘Fuse’ “not only a standout album of 2023, but one of the finest of their entire career”.
Listen to ‘At Maida Vale’ below.