Song Premiere: Rachel Sumner, “The Temptation of Adam” (Josh Ritter)

April 10, 2019 Ken Templeton

There are songs that are just so good that no one should ever cover them, and, up until a few weeks ago, I thought that Josh Ritter’s, “The Temptation of Adam,” was among that group. But Rachel Sumner’s new version brings it solidly into a new group: no one should ever cover the song, except for her.

Rachel eschews the lilting fingerpicked introduction of Ritter’s original version and starts the vocal immediately. It’s a burst, like the singer of the song has been waiting to say all of this, get it all out before Marie can say a word; it echoes the emotional drive of the song perfectly to start this way. She chooses to strum and hammer the strings, and her playing is so clean and bright, with walking bass notes beautifully grounding the rhythm.

I’d always imagined this song as a distinctly male voice (the inability to communicate in a straightforward way, the lame jokes). I don’t know that Rachel intends to reimagine this song as a female love story; but it strikes me that, in the wisdom of the federal government, it would be incredibly likely that two women or two men would be assigned to an underground missile silo with the express intent of avoiding an intimate relationship, and that makes me love the song even more.

Rachel will be releasing new covers as she gears up for her residency at Atwood’s on June 16, July 21, and August 18 (that’s every third Sunday). So we have some beautiful music coming our way and we can all get together on summer Sundays to enjoy it some more. Visit Rachel at her website for tour dates and more info.