"Devil Woman" is a 1976 hit single for Cliff Richard culled from his album I'm Nearly Famous.
Background[]
"Devil Woman" was written by Terry Britten and Christine Holmes (singer of the Family Dogg) and also recorded by Holmes under the name Kristine.
A #9 UK hit in June 1976, "Devil Woman" became Richard's first single to reach the Top 20 in the US, reaching #6 on the Billboard Hot 100, which was Richard's highest peaking single. "Devil Woman" is the third biggest-selling Cliff Richard single with over two million copies sold worldwide.
The song is told from the point of a view of a man jinxed from an encounter with a stray cat with evil eyes, and his discovery that the psychic medium (a Gypsy woman) whose help he sought to break the curse was the one responsible for the curse in the first place.
It was also one of the earliest U.S. hits to make use of Extended-range bass, reaching one whole tone lower than the conventional instrument, to include D1.
The song is heavily guitar-driven, with soft-distortion lines doubling the melody in the chorus and long, high, sustained single notes providing atmosphere over the verses. A Rhodes electric piano, drums and percussion are the only other instruments.
The musicians featured on the Cliff Richard recording are Terry Britten on guitar, Alan Tarney on bass, Clem Cattini on drums, Graham Todd on keyboards, and Tony Rivers, John Perry and A. Harding on backing vocals, with string arrangements by Richard Hewson.
Covers[]
- Lester Butler covered the song on his Red Devils album "King King".
- Riot covered the song on their 1983 album Born in America.
- Shy covered the song on their 1987 album "Excess All Areas".
- The Accüsed covered the song on their 1987 album More Fun Than An Open Casket Funeral.
- Cradle of Filth covered the song on their 2005 special edition release of 2004's 'Nymphetamine' with backing vocals by King Diamond.
- All About Eve recorded the song as a B-side of their 1987 12" single 'Flowers in our hair'. Their version also appears on the rarities compilation Return to Eden, Vol. 1: The Early Recordings.
- Flight of the Conchords did a pastiche of this song and its music video in the second season of their HBO show.
- Hank Marvin covered the song as an instrumental in 1995 on Hank Plays Cliff.
- Demon Drive covered the song for their last album in 2003, ...four play!
- Artisan covered the song on their 1989 EP Through Till Dawn
- Estonian band Radar and singer Jaak Joala covered the song in Estonian language (Title: Ohtlik naine) in 1980. Words were written by Heldur Karmo
- Estonian singer Uku Suviste covered the song in the Estonian language (Title: Saatanlik naine) in 2009, and it is used in the Estonian television show Kättemaksukontor.
- Hayseed Dixie covered as a bluegrass song in 2007 on Weapons Of Grass Destruction.