The song, “September”, was originally recorded by Earth, Wind and Fire in 1978
Maurice White (1941-2016), Al McKay (b.1948) and Allee Willis (1947-2019) wrote the song “September” for Maurice and Al’s group Earth, Wind and Fire. The track was recorded for their first greatest hits album, “The Best of Earth, Wind & Fire, Vol. 1”, in 1978 and was released as the second single in November that year, peaking at No.8 in America and No.3 in the UK, where it became the group’s first top ten hit there.
There has only been one notable cover of the song from fellow American singer Kirk Franklin (b.1970), who took the song to No.17 on the US R&B chart in 2007. His version was recorded as part of a tribute album “Interpretations: Celebrating the Music of Earth, Wind & Fire” that also featured the likes of Chaka Khan, Angie Stone and Meshell N’degeocello.
In 2021, Kylie Minogue performed the song as a piano acoustic for a live session with BBC Radio 2 along with her own hit single, “Say Something”. This offered a very different slant on the original Disco themed version that also complimented her own “Disco” studio album that was out at the time. To date, she has not recorded this song for inclusion on any of her own releases.
But which version is the best? EWaF’s original, KIRK FRANKLIN’s version or KYLIE’s acoustic version?
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