Sometimes a song has extra meaning because we associate it with part of our personal and cultural history. Sellnow explains that there is a difference between what a song communicates generally and what it communicates rhetorically (2017). When it comes to music, it seems, much of this rhetorical meaning comes from the story behind a particular song and the connections, feelings, and memories it that it conjures up. The recent resurrection of Tracy Chapman’s 1988 “Fast Car” in connection with Luke Comb’s cover of the song on his recent album has been meaningful for many people, including Comb’s. Comb’s shared his “full circle moment” in this ET clip.
While Luke Comb’s cover of the song has been at the top of country
music charts for weeks, the day following the Grammy’s, Tracy Chapman’s original
recording of her song was in No. 1 on iTunes (New York Post, Feb. 9, 2024). In
an article on how current popular culture builds on the past, Bermingham (2008) explained,
“Artists will draw on what has come before. They will build on and rearrange
ways of creating until it becomes the new folk art of the time” (para. 4). Luke
Comb's cover of “Fast Car” is a literal example of what Bermingham talked about.
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| (The Daily Beast, 2024) |
While Combs has been the artist currently performing this song, both Chapman and Comb’s have benefited in popularity and monetarily because of this “building on the past.” The fact that Chapman had not performed publicly for 15 years and has been reclusive for many of those years, adds another element to the story behind this performance (New York Post, 2024). For those of us who have loved both versions of the song, listening to the two perform together added more dynamic to the rhetorical components of the song. While the song itself has great meaning, the historical and emotional context add to powerful performance of the two musicians. What other performances have carried extra meaning because of the story behind the music and what made them special?
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