Songs For Your Day

In 1971 singer-songwriter Judee Sill wrote “Jesus Was a Crossmaker” as a late addition to her debut album. She performed the song on piano reasonably well, but listening to it might make you wonder if your turntable is going just a few RPMs faster than it should. Apparently Graham Nash produced the song, and I can only conjecture that, given the appetite Sill and Nash had for cocaine in that era, they assumed they were recording the song at a reasonable speed.

Thankfully, in 1972 The Hollies covered the song on their album Romany. Ironically, Graham Nash had been a founding member of The Hollies before leaving the group in 1968. I’ve never listened to the full album, but AllMusic gave it only 3/5 stars. So maybe it’s a tepid album at best, but I believe at least one great song can justify a whole album, and “Jesus Was a Crossmaker” is an easy justification for anyone wanting to purchase Romany.

The slower tempo of The Hollies’ version, combined with the band’s harmonized vocals, make the song irresistibly haunting. It’s a good late-night song, almost pious, though when you read the lyrics apart from listening to the music, Jesus’ presence as a character isn’t exactly clear. Is it His sweet song that’s so enticing? Is He the bandit and the heartbreaker? Apparently not. He’s just a cross maker against whom Sill was contrasting her unidentified subject. The thing is, though, you won’t really care about any of this when you listen to The Hollies sing. It’s just too pretty for you to care.