Christina Martin channels the pain of romantic loss in her cover of ABBA’s The Winner Takes It All — premiering exclusively on Tinnitist.
The award-winning Nova Scotia singer-songwriter’s heartfelt cover of the Swedish superstars’ classic power ballad comes from her just-released seventh album Wonderful Lie.
“I haven’t split with anyone in a while, but when I sing this song it reminds me of how hard breakups can be,” Martin shares. “It’s definitely a favourite of mine from my high school days, singing along and dancing to ABBA, before I knew anything about breaking up with someone or getting dumped.”
Long known and lauded for her signature indie pop-to-rock style, Wonderful Lie sees Martin wading effortlessly into the roots-rock and Americana sound pool. Among the album’s 10 cuts, six are inspired covers gathered from a wide variety of sources, styles and songwriters.
“Some of the songs on this record have been favourites of mine for decades. When I was living in Austin, a friend gave me a cassette tape of live acoustic recordings,” she recalls. “Shawn Colvin was on it, and I was enthralled by her performance of a song called Even Here We Are, written by American songwriter Paul Westerberg. That’s when I started listening to Paul, and one of my favourites of his was always It’s A Wonderful Lie.
“This year felt like the right time to explore our take on six of my favourite songs,” she continues. “The tie that binds across this album is that all the songs are mostly very stripped down in nature.”
Along with the ABBA cut and the Westerberg number that lends the disc its title, Wonderful Lie also includes Christina’s takes on Leonard Cohen’s Tonight Will Be Fine, Bob Dylan’s Make You Feel My Love, Richard Thompson’s A Heart Needs a Home and more.
Check out The Winner Takes It All above and keep up with Christina Martin via her website, Twitter, Facebook and Instagram.
