Annie Lennox / Nostalgia / 2014
I Put a Spell On You
smoldering, wounded, controlled desperation
Annie Lennox's reading of this Screamin' Jay Hawkins standard, cut for her covers album Nostalgia, strips the song down to its raw psychological core: possessive love shading into desperation. Her jazz-torch phrasing turns a novelty-horror classic into a controlled study of obsession and heartbreak.
possessive love jealousy desperation powerlessness obsession masquerading as devotion
Who's speaking
A first-person speaker addresses an unfaithful lover directly, oscillating between threat and pleading; the voice is emotionally raw but not fully reliable, since the claim of ownership contradicts the admission of being discarded.
What happens
The song doesn't develop a plot so much as circle a single emotional knot: the speaker declares ownership over a partner who is straying, alternates between anger at being humiliated and helpless declarations of love, and ends still trapped in the same possessive refrain, unresolved.
How it's built
Built almost entirely on repetition rather than progression -- the title phrase and the 'because you're mine' line recur like an incantation, framing short accusatory verses. There's no real bridge or resolution; the arrangement (in Lennox's version, sparse piano/vocal built into something more theatrical) lets the repetition carry the tension instead of narrative movement.
Section by section
Opening incantation
“I put a spell on you”
The song opens with its central claim stated as fact, not metaphor -- establishing the speaker's belief that love can be commanded rather than earned.
Accusation verse
“You're running around”
The tone shifts from magical claim to direct confrontation, revealing the wound underneath the possessiveness: infidelity, or the fear of it.
Declaration of love
The speaker pivots to unconditional devotion, insisting love persists regardless of rejection -- a moment that reads as vulnerable but also as self-erasure, since the beloved's wishes seem irrelevant to the speaker's resolve.
Closing repetition
“Because you're mine”
The song ends where it began, looping the possessive claim without resolution, suggesting the spell -- and the emotional trap -- never actually breaks.
Craft
- anaphora
- The repeated declaration of ownership functions as a ritual chant, reinforcing the idea of the title phrase as literal magic -- an attempt to control through language.
- metaphor (spell-casting)
- Romantic possession is cast as literal witchcraft, collapsing the line between desire and coercion; love is framed as something imposed rather than mutual.
- contradiction/juxtaposition
- Lines of tender devotion sit right next to accusations and threats, dramatizing how possessiveness and affection blur together in the speaker's mind.
Reading it
The most persuasive reading treats the song as a portrait of possessive love curdling into control, where the language of enchantment masks jealousy and fear of abandonment. Lennox's interpretive choice -- her restrained, torchy delivery rather than Hawkins' theatrical growl -- pushes the song toward sorrow and vulnerability rather than menace, foregrounding the pain beneath the possessiveness. An alternative reading, closer to the original 1956 version's camp and horror theatrics, treats the 'spell' as playful hyperbole about romantic obsession rather than a serious claim of ownership; Lennox's version leans away from that camp toward genuine ache.
Context
The song is a cover of Screamin' Jay Hawkins' 1956 original, one of the most covered songs in American popular music, recorded by artists from Nina Simone to Creedence Clearwater Revival. Lennox included it on Nostalgia (2014), an album of jazz-era and mid-century standards, reinterpreted through her own phrasing and arrangement choices rather than as a strict recreation of Hawkins' theatrical original.
Listen for
- The contrast between Lennox's restrained vocal control and the song's manic original delivery
- How repetition of the title phrase functions almost as ritual rather than narrative
- The tonal whiplash between tenderness and accusation within a few lines
- Any horn or piano arrangement choices that evoke the song's blues/jazz lineage
- The lack of resolution at the song's end, mirroring the emotional stasis of the lyric
About Annie Lennox
Ann Lennox is a Scottish singer-songwriter, political activist and philanthropist. After achieving moderate success in the late 1970s as part of the new wave band the Tourists, she and fellow musician Dave Stewart went on to achieve international success in the 1980s as Eurythmics.
b. 1954 / United Kingdom
Full biography and catalogue