I saw Marianne Faithfull’s death announced last night.

She first came to prominence in 1964 due to her association with The Rolling Stones (Jagger and Richards wrote her first hit.) She had a sweet but almost insubstantial voice suited to soft pop songs but by the mid 60s her singing career had stalled, in part due to a drugs scandal. She took up acting with some success though but mostly fell out of public consciousness.

Here’s Faithfull’s version of a Jackie DeShannon song that gave her her highest UK chart placing (no 4 in 1965 as compared to the no 9 achieved by As Tears Go By the year before.)

Marianne Faithfull: Come and Stay with Me

The song below is from her 1980 “comeback”* album of the same title, which is widely regarded as her best, not least by herself.

*Even if Dreamin’ my Dreams had intervened in 1976

Marianne Faithfull: Broken English

Marianne Evelyn Gabriel Faithfull: 29/12/1946 – 30/1/2025. So it goes.

I only discovered this week that John D Loudermilk has also gone from us this year.

He didn’t have a hit in his own right in the UK but was the composer of several for others.

Tobacco Road was covered by the Nashville Teens,

The Nashville Teens: Tobacco Road

This Little Bird by Marianne Faithfull,

Marianne Faithfull: This Little Bird

and Lament of the Cherokee Reservation Indian – which I remember as titled (The Lament of the Cherokee) Indian Reservation; a change which makes the lament a more general rather than individual one – by Don Fardon.

Don Fardon: Indian Reservation

John D. Loudermilk: 31/3/1934 – September 21/9/2016. So it goes.