Am I the only one who never knew Heartbeats by Jose Gonzalez was a cover?

This song has come up three times in the past day in the most random of circumstances.

It’s like divine intervention is prompting me to write about it so I feel compelled to comply…for both the truly awesome nature of the song, and partially for fear of the universe turning against me.

So on that note…

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Originally a song by Swedish synth-pop duo The Knife, Jose Gonzalez released his acoustic version of Heartbeats as the lead single of his debut album Veneers.

The album, which received global critical acclaim, was first released in Gonzalez’s home country of Sweden in October 2003 before making it to the UK and the rest of Europe two years later.

After being featured on an advert for Sony (the one with all the bouncy balls falling down the street), Heartbeats became a huge hit around the world, most notably for its exquisitely smooth melody coupled with Gonzalez’s obscenely serene vocal grasp of the song’s troubled yet eloquently haunting lyrics.

Peaking at No. 9 in the Top 40, the Heartbeats cover spent a massive 33 weeks in the charts in January 2006.

The album itself reached No.7 in the UK album charts and sold over 700,000 copies worldwide, appearing in Australian, Belgian and Dutch charts.

Making an acoustic cover of Heartbeats, despite writing his own music, was a bold move for Gonzalez though.

The original electro-pop version by The Knife had been well received, notable for its reverberating female vocals over serrated synth chords and dense layers of upbeat melody, despite its turbulent tale of infidelity.

The song featured as the first single off the band’s second album Deep Cuts, from January 2003 – a mere ten months before Gonzalez released his acoustic cover on his debut record.

With both acts hailing from the same city of Gothenburg in Sweden too, releasing this decidedly different version of the song would have been a risky move for Gonzalez to make when establishing himself as a new artist, with fans of the band and the original in such close proximity.

However, after the slight nudge the Sony advert had influenced in 2005, a global audience had recognised and become captivated by Gonzalez’s heart achingly soft, introverted portrayal of the song’s illustrative lyrics.

Heartbeats’ global success ultimately led to wider recognition for The Knife too, with their version of the song recently being listed as No. 95 on the NME website’s 150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years.

Listening to both styles, it’s difficult to state that one is out rightly better than the other; instead having two distinguishably different versions means you can appreciate the stark comparison in the individual interpretation of the same song even more.

After the phenomenal success of Veneers, Jose Gonzalez went on to release his second album, In Our Nature, in September 2007.

While the first album was very much centred on his acoustic guitar and subtly toned melodies, the follow-up was somewhat more progressive in comparison, introducing synthesizers and additional vocals on some of the new tracks.

While In Our Nature was somewhat less prosperous than his debut, Gonzalez did make another acoustic cover on the second album, this time of Massive Attack’s Teardrop, which later featured in the season four finale of the globally successful TV show House M.D.

Jose Gonzalez is currently releasing music as vocalist and guitarist for Junip, a three piece band he shares with fellow Swedish musicians Tobias Winterkorn and Elias Araya.