Description
180-gram gatefold LP
Yusuf / Cat Stevens pays tribute to landmark album with new takes on cherished hits!
Fifty years after the original made him a global superstar Yusuf / Cat Stevens has rerecorded an entirely new version of his 1970 classic album Tea For The Tillerman.
With many of the era-defining album's songs sounding more relevant than ever today, Tea For The Tillerman 2 offers up striking and sensitive new renditions of stone-cold classics like "Father And Son," "Wild World," and "Where Do The Children Play?"
"Though my songwriting adventures were never limited to Tillerman, the songs on that album certainly defined me and pointed the way for my mysterious life's journey. Since those originative sessions in Morgan Studios, Willesden, in 1970, Tillerman has grown and developed its own gravitas and influence on music history and as the soundtrack to so many people's lives. Like it was destiny waiting to happen, T4TT² feels like the timing of its message has arrived again," Stevens says.
The concept for Tea for the Tillerman² grew out of a conversation, fittingly, between Yusuf and his son about how to celebrate the album's 50th anniversary. This gave birth to the idea of reimagining and rerecording the songs, and the results speak for themselves. Paul Samwell-Smith was contacted and a week was booked at La Fabrique Studios, in the South of France in the Summer of 2019, close to Saint-Rémy-de-Provence where Van Gogh painted some of his most famous works. The studio itself carries a rich and varied history, having once been a factory for dyeing the prestigious red jackets of Napoleon's famous Hussars and also being home to one of the largest collections of classic French cinema and vinyl records. Providentially, the whole experience was filmed.
Tea for the Tillerman² sees Yusuf reunite with all the key actors from the original album — producer Paul Samwell-Smith and Alun Davies on guitar. They are joined by Bruce Lynch on bass, a member of Yusuf's band from the mid-70s. Guitarist Eric Appapoulay and multi-instrumentalist Kwame Yeboah on percussion and keys represent Yusuf's current live band and they are supported by Jim Cregan on guitar and Peter Vettese on keys. The session was engineered by David Hefti who has contributed to Yusuf's sound live and in the studio for close to 10 years.
