Presumably Mick Jagger is already looking into how a cover of The Rolling Stones‘ classic, You Can’t Always Get What You Want, can be turned into a Foreign Tongues vinyl variant. Jagger and company have had all sorts of special editions to tie in to sporting events, supermarkets, and now extra material as part of a re-release. There is still time for The Rolling Stones to include a special edition featuring this cover from Sam Fender. The Seventeen Going Under superstar has never hidden his rock roots and seems to enjoy the Bruce Springsteen-adjacent sound so much he has continued to meddle with it in the build-up to his fourth album. Once that cycle begins, who knows where this cover of You Can’t Always Get What You Want will end up. It’ll hardly slot into his setlist all too often, and not because it’s been created for the purposes of the capitalist machine. John Lewis is hard to turn down, even after they exiled a man on the moon. Would they do the same to Fender had he turned down Lewis, Jagger, and the promise of a feel-good Christmas?
Probably. He cannot take that chance when the moon is so far from St. James’ Park. You Can’t Always Get What You Want in the hands of arguably the freshest and largest face in the modern-day guitar rock scene is a match made in heaven for those wanting a new route into a classic song. Certain songs are sacred but all are fair fodder for the cover version bound to happen down the line. Just look at how many people tackled Bob Dylan’s discography. At least Fender has a knack for songwriting and, when pushed to his best, can find the right groove and tempo for that guitar rock style he has so far nailed across his three albums. You Can’t Always Get What You Want is a neat addition to his discography but nothing outstanding. Cover versions often struggle to stand out when the artist who is taking a dive into old material can’t seem to figure out a bigger or better message.
Changing the context of the song to not getting what you want for Christmas feels a touch tacky, but Fender carries it with his ever-strong vocal work. Fender finds himself pulling at his roots once more, a move that feels touched by the heavy hand of commercialism a little too much now that Londoners are donning Newcastle United strips. But there’s no way of separating Fender from the area of his origins now, much like there’s no removing the original meaning of You Can’t Always Get What You Want. Fender doesn’t try to remove that either. A softer instrumental flourish, some nice acoustics is a change-up that, unlike some of Fender’s most recent works, highlights his vocal strength. There’s inevitabilities to Fender’s music that have started appearing after his third album and they’re ingrained here, too.
While it suits You Can’t Always Get What You Want, there is a worry that that’s all he has in the tank. At least with instrumental variation you can take the lyricism and poetry of great work, as Fender has written, in new directions. This feels like a short and somewhat rushed experience, picking apart a song of great magnitude. It’s not about sounding better or bigger than the original, but different. That northern charm Fender has deep in his vocals is the winning part of his cover of one of The Rolling Stones’ greatest songs, but there’s much more to be desired from it, too. You Can’t Always Get What You Want doesn’t need to be tied to the holiday season but, for its use and thus the listening experience, Fender’s take on the song is weakened by the seasonal experience. He has the same insight as Jagger, but doesn’t quite build on that.
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