Tempted by Squeeze

If you don’t know Squeeze, you may be wondering why this track sounds so different from their other song in the game, “Cool For Cats.” Two years went by between songs, during which Squeeze got stacks of critical raves and became more ambitious with their songwriting. The Cockney humor of the early days was scrapped and they tried different directions.

“Tempted” was meant to be a ballad that a great soul group like the Temptations might have done. The lead vocal was done by newly-added keyboardist Paul Carrack (who later joined Mike & the Mechanics and sang their hit “The Living Years”). “Tempted” was in fact the only lead vocal that Carrack did with Squeeze (until he rejoined in the '90s and got one more). When they play live nowadays it’s handled by the group’s usual lead singer Glenn Tilbrook.

Check the second-verse line “The people keep on crowding me, wishing I was well.” If it sounds different from the rest of the song, that’s because it’s sung by the producer—Elvis Costello.

This song is all about the vocal, so the singer has to deliver a polished, soulful performance while most of the band gets to rest (Attention, singers: Watch those deep-voice-to-falsetto jumps when Costello sings in the second verse).

Guitar players might want to use this one as a chance to try bass, as there’s virtually no lead guitar and the bass part is far funkier and more interesting.

The drum part has some bass-drum fills at the very end that won’t fail you, but may keep you from Gold Starring an otherwise dead-easy part.

Squeeze broke up in the late ‘90s but reunited in 2007, without Carrack but with leaders Glenn Tilbrook and Chris Difford.