Cat Stevens - The First Cut Is The Deepest

What this video is

Recorded in 1967, this performance captures Cat Stevens at the hinge-point between his orchestrated Decca/Deram baroque-pop debut era and the acoustic singer-songwriter reinvention that would follow his 1969 tuberculosis recovery. The song itself — written in 1965 and sold to P.P. Arnold for £30 before Stevens recorded his own version — embodies the Tin Pan Alley-to-personal-expression transition underway in…

Why it matters

Stands as an early primary-source document of British baroque pop and the singer-songwriter tradition. The song has become one of the most covered compositions in post-war popular music, recorded by P.P. Arnold (1967), Keith Hampshire (1973), Rod Stewart (1977), Papa Dee (1995), and Sheryl Crow…