Joy | 3BOPS

1. Chris Stapleton, “Joy of My Life”

💿 Starting Over • 🏷 Mercury • 📅 2020

“Some may have their riches / Some may have their worldly things / As long as I have you / I’ll treasure each and every day.” On his fourth studio album, 💿 Starting Over (2020), 🏆 Grammy-winner 🎙 Chris Stapleton doesn’t merely serve up originals.  He also gives us several delightful covers.  Among them is the joyful and incredibly thoughtful ✅ 🎵 “Joy of My Life,” a 🎙 John Fogerty gem. Hey, can you go wrong with Fogerty or CCR for that matter?

Stapleton delivers quite an expressive vocal performance, but there’s also balance.  He still manages to cut through the production, but he’s also passionate and quite tender, as he asserts:

“She takes me by the hand
I am the luckiest man alive
Did I tell you baby
You’re the joy of my life.”

2. Bastille, “Joy”

💿 Doom Days • 🏷 Virgin • 📅 2019

“Yeah, I feel my pulse quickening / When your name lights up the screen.” 🎙 Bastille are indeed ‘joyful’ on 🎵 “Joy”, the closing cut and third single from 💿 Doom Days.  Prior to the aforementioned chorus that seems to exhibit a dash of object sexuality, there’s drunkenness on the first verse (“Thought I’d never be waking on the kitchen floor / But here I lie, not the first time”).  On the second, front man 🎙 Dan Smith shares his mental anguish with the person who ultimately gives him ‘joy’ (“I’m your walking disaster, keep on dragging me / From self-pity, poor me.”

Confirming the joy is the bridge where Smith sings, “As night dissolves into this final frame / You’re a sweet relief, you save me from my brain.” Of course, nothing better exemplifies it than the chorus, the centerpiece of this gem:

“Oh joy, when you call me
I was giving up, oh, I was giving in
Joy, set my mind free
I was giving up, oh, I was giving in.”

3. Pentatonix, “Joyful, Joyful”

Ft. Jazmine Sullivan

💿 The Best of Pentatonix Christmas • 🏷 RCA • 📅 2019

🎙 Pentatonix – what a beastly vocal group! One thing that the group does extreme well (besides those 🔥 vocals) are perform Christmas songs.  On their 2019 compilation, 💿 The Best of Pentatonix Christmas, they enlist another incredibly talented vocalist, 🎙 Jazmine Sullivan for the utterly joyful bop, “Joyful, Joyful.”

Calling “Ode to Joy” a bop might seem sketchy but not this particular interpretation!  Basically, this version with layered vocal harmonies is more 📽 Sister Act 2 than Beethoven. Jazmine Sullivan takes the lead on the slow, soulful, and spiritually tinged intro – channeling 🎙 Lauryn Hill, of course!  She milks the vocal for all its worth, with PTX providing her a rich palette to sing over.  Then, the tempo kicks up, and “Joyful Joyful” transforms into a gospel joint.  We don’t hear from Sullivan for a while, but she returns, filled with joy on the bluesy, gospel ad-libs.  Let the church say “YES,” or better yet “JOY!”