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Frightened Rabbit covers project turns from tribute to memorial

By Loring Wirbel

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Fifteen musical pals of the Scottish mope-rock band Frightened Rabbit got together in early 2018 to pay tribute to the decade-old Frightened Rabbit album Midnight Organ Fight. In May 2018, the band’s founder Scott Hutchison took his own life, and the covers effort suddenly took a more serious turn. Atlantic UK/Warner Music has just released Tiny Changes, a compilation with a strange, powerful mix of relaxed covers from the likes of Julien Baker and Chvrches’ Lauren Mayberry, alongside serious messages on suicide. There also is a free download of a live performance from Baker, The National’s Aaron Dessner and others at tinyurl.com/Indy-Playlist-download.

The heartfelt warmth of most of the album is tempered by the wildly different tones of “My Backwards Walk” from Manchester Orchestra and comedian Sarah Silverman; the obscenely bitter “Keep Yourself Warm” rendered by Death Cab for Cutie’s Ben Gibbard; the eerily prescient “Floating in the Forth” from The Twilight Sad; and the anthemic “Head Rolls Off” from The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn, who tells the listener, “while I’m alive, I’ll make tiny changes to Earth.” Go then and do likewise.

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