Friday, July 17, 2020

“Let’s Work Together,” again

It’s occurred to me that “Let’s Work Together” makes a suitable anthem for these times. The song is by Wilbert Harrison, who recorded it in 1969 as Wilbert Harrison One Man Band. Canned Heat recorded the song later that year with greater success.

And now the Heat has recorded the song again, with William Shatner, for — Lord have mercy — a Shatner blues album. Listen if you dare.

I still think “Let’s Work Together” is right for these times. But I’ll take Wilbert Harrison and Bob “The Bear” Hite over Captain Kirk any day.

Related reading
All OCA Canned Heat posts (Pinboard)

[Extraneous matter: I discovered only recently that the song’s lyrics borrow from two lines of “Don’t Quit,” a poem attributed to Edgar A. Guest, among others: “When things go wrong, as they sometimes will, / When the road you're trudging seems all up hill.”]

comments: 2

Fresca said...

I often can't stand Shatner's "singing" but I gotta say, I love this!
So ridiculous--it made me smile and think, heck , why not?
Let's make someone happy. Let's work together.

Michael Leddy said...

I hope it makes some money. Canned Heat signed away the publishing rights to their Liberty recordings years ago to get the funds to cover bail after a drug bust. So whenever you hear, say, “Goin’ Up the Country,” no one from the group or their heirs gets a cent.