Roy’s treatment and recovery makes socialized commie healthcare sound like a good thing.
As for covers, I know nothing and have no taste. As such, Clapton’s recreation of Layla was, like, a lesson.
Too, can’t think of the kind of cover that shines a light on a previously recorded song. But I do remember running ZZ Top’s cover of Viva Los Vegas on repeat for such a long that it burned out the CD drive. (That said, it sooo many times. Drive was probably fragile to begin with.)
Was going to mention that one! Sounds like a privileged new-money douchebag who's sitting at the craps table after dropping a $1000 token in a slot machine and having it come up nothing.
I still have nightmares of endless Ruby Keelers from the Busby Berkley treatment of I Only Have Eyes For You, from "Dames": Dick Powell, and prepsychedelic madness...
The Flamingo's cover is pure, almost abstract do-wop perfection.
Glad to hear you're pulling thru the post-op bullshittery. Worst part of all that is that one is mostly awake. Bleah!
I never say "Best" because who am I to say? It's not like I run a Substack or something... :P Let's "great" or "favorite." Love the Minutemen's covers. "Don't Look Now" is a classic, as much for the crowd noise as the performance. I prefer their "Dr. Wu" to the original, strange to say. Another I like better than the original is Johnny Cash's majestic "The Mercy Seat" which amps the pathos of this all-too American story. [Hard to pick here: "Rusty Cage" & "Bridge Over Troubled Water" too]. How about The Indigo Girls' version of "Romeo & Juliet" by The Dire Straits. Of course, Screamin' Jay Hawkins' version of "I Put a Spell on You." [Many of The Cramps' best tracks were actually covers of obscure 1960s 45s as well.]
But for a real treat, I give you all drone metal giants Nadja's brain-melting cover/tribute to MBV's "Only Shallow." I shit you not (for what would I get out that? Less shit, that's what) -- First time I heard it, I had to pull the car over while driving because I started seeing things. Straight up tripping balls mid-day.
Sorry, always too many. I'm a hapless adherent of William Blake's "Proverb of Hell": "Too much? Or just enough?" (The Marriage of Heaven & Hell [1798])
As soon as I saw Lux Interior, squished into a latex jumpsuit, wearing heels, climb onto a 12-foot stack of amplifiers at the edge of the stage & totter unsteadily there like he was considering a jump into the crowd -- with Poison Ivy looking on resignedly -- I was hooked.
I never knew it was possible to be punk & gender-nonconforming. That meant so much to me.
"Rowboat" is so good, and I love to imagine Rick Rubin sitting Johnny Cash down to listen to Stereopathic Soulmanure.
My favorite of the Cash/Rubin covers was the first one I heard, when I came home one day from class and my roommate had downloaded "I Won't Back Down" off Napster(!) I always thought that one should have gotten as much love as "Hurt." When Cash says he won't back down, I believe him. And Tom Petty even sings backup!
There are very few covers I like, and I’m not sure why that is but I’m perfectly open to the idea it has to do with my limitations and not the reimagined performance of the artist.
A couple of exceptions I can think of: I really enjoyed Fiona Apple’s Across the Universe. In execution it was very faithful to the original, but tonally seemed to turn things on its head – the Beatles version sounds like a hallucinatory, quasi-euphoric exploration, Fiona’s sounds like the drugged, existential resignation of a madwoman. That tickles me for whatever reason.
And Aretha Franklin’s version of Carole King’s Natural Woman, because Aretha improves everything she touches.
You missed a prime opportunity to drop an “actually” in there, lol. I’m sure you’re right, but King’s was the one I heard for years (on the radio) before I heard Aretha’s.
Nina was of mixed enthusiasms about that song, partly because her version was so damn popular. You can find her on video almost snarling at the audience "Here's the song you all came to hear"...
Edit to add her version is way better than the original, for her singing and piano playing equally.
The other fun thing about the song is that the lyric is tailored to be messed with. Easy to plug in new names and new declamations to fit the time and the audience. My friend the English professor and Irish lit expert is fond of the act of switching out words for effects both humorous and insightful.
I used Cyndi's "Money Changes Everything" during fund drives at the radio station. And, of course, Newman's "It's Money that Matters" and the OJs "Love of Money" and both versions of "Money" as well as Pink Floyd's "Money."
Also, Cake's cover is amusing, but I have many happy memories of dancing to Gloria Gaynor's version with my cousin Tommy and his friends in pre-AIDS NYC so I can't give a fair shake to any other version. I've grown more sentimental as the years roll along.
I know you've had some real challenges lately. Serious surgery with life or death implications with huge amounts of pain and frustration . I feel bad for you. Yet, I gotta admit - it's been hugely entertaining. This was laugh out loud funny at least 5 times in 4 paragraphs. You, Mr. Ed Roso, are a trooper.
There are a handful of songs that I like the cover as well as the original. "Little Wing" is a great example: Hendrix, Clapton and Alman, Stevie Ray Vaughn--each different from the other, and each outstanding. Or "Money" as done by Barret Strong and by the Beatles--both fun and well done.
John Cale's version of "Heartbreak Hotel" from his 1975 "Slow Dazzle" LP. Primal scream Lennon meets a wall of noise. It has a soft spot for me, as it was my gateway drug to all things Cale and beyond. I'm willing to bet Danny Boyle had it in mind when he did the detox sequence in "Trainspotting."
Her album HYMNS OF THE 49TH PARALLEL is all covers of Canadien songs, and it’s quite the experience. (I think DRAG is also all covers. Miz Lang can do no wrong, in my book)
Could go so many ways with this one, but since I just heard it driving into work this morning and was blown away by it, I’ll go with To Know Him is to Love Him, by Amy Winehouse.
Or if you want to do You Tube videos, none’s better than Red Right Hand by The Diminished Minor Chord. https://youtu.be/TE5JPpzrSmE
Goddamn right -- Laibach has a gift for finding the terrifying in pop songs.
Their "Gebürt Einer Nation" is a fucking trip.
Don't hog all the credit – we olds are pretty much self-freaking anymore...
ALMOST ANY COVER SONG EVER DONE BY GREG DULLI.
And also the Rolling Stones’ “Satisfaction,” as interpreted by PJ Harvey and Björk (https://youtu.be/a8RFignlzaM)
Seconded: I think I heard Uncle Mick say he thought it was the best he had heard.
The original version of “Satisfaction” will never satisfy me again
Right?!?! And I actually *like* the original. Also: Jane’s Addiction cover of “sympathy for the devil,” which hopefully you’ll be sympathetic towards.
That's cute. Polly Jean has a new one, it's good! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LvYMlixvzHM
She’s one of the greatest of her/my generation.
Roy’s treatment and recovery makes socialized commie healthcare sound like a good thing.
As for covers, I know nothing and have no taste. As such, Clapton’s recreation of Layla was, like, a lesson.
Too, can’t think of the kind of cover that shines a light on a previously recorded song. But I do remember running ZZ Top’s cover of Viva Los Vegas on repeat for such a long that it burned out the CD drive. (That said, it sooo many times. Drive was probably fragile to begin with.)
It's so thin and snide!
Was going to mention that one! Sounds like a privileged new-money douchebag who's sitting at the craps table after dropping a $1000 token in a slot machine and having it come up nothing.
Lester Bowie & Brass Fantasy: I Only Have Eyes For You
Funny, mesmerizing, ultimately magisterial.
Also, pretty much everything Lambert Hendricks & Ross recorded.
I still have nightmares of endless Ruby Keelers from the Busby Berkley treatment of I Only Have Eyes For You, from "Dames": Dick Powell, and prepsychedelic madness...
The Flamingo's cover is pure, almost abstract do-wop perfection.
Glad to hear you're pulling thru the post-op bullshittery. Worst part of all that is that one is mostly awake. Bleah!
I never say "Best" because who am I to say? It's not like I run a Substack or something... :P Let's "great" or "favorite." Love the Minutemen's covers. "Don't Look Now" is a classic, as much for the crowd noise as the performance. I prefer their "Dr. Wu" to the original, strange to say. Another I like better than the original is Johnny Cash's majestic "The Mercy Seat" which amps the pathos of this all-too American story. [Hard to pick here: "Rusty Cage" & "Bridge Over Troubled Water" too]. How about The Indigo Girls' version of "Romeo & Juliet" by The Dire Straits. Of course, Screamin' Jay Hawkins' version of "I Put a Spell on You." [Many of The Cramps' best tracks were actually covers of obscure 1960s 45s as well.]
But for a real treat, I give you all drone metal giants Nadja's brain-melting cover/tribute to MBV's "Only Shallow." I shit you not (for what would I get out that? Less shit, that's what) -- First time I heard it, I had to pull the car over while driving because I started seeing things. Straight up tripping balls mid-day.
Sorry, always too many. I'm a hapless adherent of William Blake's "Proverb of Hell": "Too much? Or just enough?" (The Marriage of Heaven & Hell [1798])
For reference:
https://youtu.be/UPWN6gZq9cQ
https://youtu.be/XoJ0bAp4Eo8
https://youtu.be/Y-oMFT1mbUY
https://youtu.be/82cdnAUvsw8
https://youtu.be/RQbXWD7l4vw
2 marks for Screamin' Jay, but hearted for the Cramps.
As soon as I saw Lux Interior, squished into a latex jumpsuit, wearing heels, climb onto a 12-foot stack of amplifiers at the edge of the stage & totter unsteadily there like he was considering a jump into the crowd -- with Poison Ivy looking on resignedly -- I was hooked.
I never knew it was possible to be punk & gender-nonconforming. That meant so much to me.
Among my top 10 live show bands, yeah.
I have to admit Nadja out-MBVs MBV. But I'll still be happy with MBV.
It's lovely innit? That slow drone is why I love Nadja so much!
It’s gotta be the Johnny Cash version of Hurt. He basically weaponizes that song. The video is also incredible.
Also, both of The Swans’ versions of Love Will Tear Us Apart
Yeah. I was dubious going in, but it got me by the end.
"weaponizes"
Well said.
Could be many Johnny Cash covers. I think I’d go with One, Row Boat or Mercy Seat over Hurt, but reasonable people can certainly disagree.
"Rowboat" is so good, and I love to imagine Rick Rubin sitting Johnny Cash down to listen to Stereopathic Soulmanure.
My favorite of the Cash/Rubin covers was the first one I heard, when I came home one day from class and my roommate had downloaded "I Won't Back Down" off Napster(!) I always thought that one should have gotten as much love as "Hurt." When Cash says he won't back down, I believe him. And Tom Petty even sings backup!
Don’t know which surprised me more: that Beck wrote it or that Cash covered it.
And now that I'm on this train of thought, Beck's cover of Skip Spence's "Halo of Gold."
There are very few covers I like, and I’m not sure why that is but I’m perfectly open to the idea it has to do with my limitations and not the reimagined performance of the artist.
A couple of exceptions I can think of: I really enjoyed Fiona Apple’s Across the Universe. In execution it was very faithful to the original, but tonally seemed to turn things on its head – the Beatles version sounds like a hallucinatory, quasi-euphoric exploration, Fiona’s sounds like the drugged, existential resignation of a madwoman. That tickles me for whatever reason.
And Aretha Franklin’s version of Carole King’s Natural Woman, because Aretha improves everything she touches.
Not to be one of those people, but isn't Aretha's version the original, and Carole's version the cover (despite being the songwriter)?
You missed a prime opportunity to drop an “actually” in there, lol. I’m sure you’re right, but King’s was the one I heard for years (on the radio) before I heard Aretha’s.
Cake's cover of "I Will Survive"
The Wallflower's "I'm Lookin' Thru You" (from the "I Am Sam" soundtrack".)
Cyndi Lauper's cover of the Brain's "Money Changes Everything" turns a breakup song, great in it's way, into an anthem: in a good way.
Dolly Parton, Linda Ronstandt and Emmy Lou Harris "After the Gold Rush" might make me cry.
And Nina Simone's "My Baby Just cares for me" is perfect: with Ardman Animation, makes me happy.
https://youtu.be/Bq4aPrS9YWQ
That Nina Simone cut is one of my favorites and that cartoon is a treat, thanks!
Nina was of mixed enthusiasms about that song, partly because her version was so damn popular. You can find her on video almost snarling at the audience "Here's the song you all came to hear"...
Edit to add her version is way better than the original, for her singing and piano playing equally.
Crap. Can't get this one outta my head.
The other fun thing about the song is that the lyric is tailored to be messed with. Easy to plug in new names and new declamations to fit the time and the audience. My friend the English professor and Irish lit expert is fond of the act of switching out words for effects both humorous and insightful.
I used Cyndi's "Money Changes Everything" during fund drives at the radio station. And, of course, Newman's "It's Money that Matters" and the OJs "Love of Money" and both versions of "Money" as well as Pink Floyd's "Money."
I'd totally forgotten about that Nina Simone cover -- yep, that's one of the few on my list, too.
Also, Cake's cover is amusing, but I have many happy memories of dancing to Gloria Gaynor's version with my cousin Tommy and his friends in pre-AIDS NYC so I can't give a fair shake to any other version. I've grown more sentimental as the years roll along.
The Cake one is there because it was my breakup song for the Log KKKabin Libertarian.
Also, I kinda, sorta resemble the singer.
I know you've had some real challenges lately. Serious surgery with life or death implications with huge amounts of pain and frustration . I feel bad for you. Yet, I gotta admit - it's been hugely entertaining. This was laugh out loud funny at least 5 times in 4 paragraphs. You, Mr. Ed Roso, are a trooper.
I could do the cover thing all day...
Here's a good start -
https://youtu.be/Kje7M0KxnRk
Pairs nicely with this-
https://youtu.be/Mz8w6Z2posQ
Is that a cover? The lyrics are from a pretty famous sermon. I say YES.
Now this is a cover-
https://youtu.be/iYuldgIOelY
Totally did not know that Cardigans joint, thanks!
The Bangles' cover of "Hazy Shade of Winter." Gets me every time, whereas the original just leaves me flat.
How strange! I like them both.
There are a handful of songs that I like the cover as well as the original. "Little Wing" is a great example: Hendrix, Clapton and Alman, Stevie Ray Vaughn--each different from the other, and each outstanding. Or "Money" as done by Barret Strong and by the Beatles--both fun and well done.
John Cale's version of "Heartbreak Hotel" from his 1975 "Slow Dazzle" LP. Primal scream Lennon meets a wall of noise. It has a soft spot for me, as it was my gateway drug to all things Cale and beyond. I'm willing to bet Danny Boyle had it in mind when he did the detox sequence in "Trainspotting."
I saw him do that at the old NY Palladium in 1975. Creeeeepy
I heard Cale’s version first… after I heard the original I thought, “Is that all?”
I wouldn't go that far.
"The Air That I Breathe" by kd lang.
I never would have guessed! What a sweet, delicate touch.
Just the other day WFUV played a cover of this song by The Mavericks, who I didn't know, and for a minute I was certain it was Roy Orbison.
Her album HYMNS OF THE 49TH PARALLEL is all covers of Canadien songs, and it’s quite the experience. (I think DRAG is also all covers. Miz Lang can do no wrong, in my book)
Some folks make it into their 70's and 80's and their voice just gets better- Willy Nelson, Bob Weir, Patti Smith- and Tom
Jones come to mind-
Tom does Leonard Cohen - great video too.
https://youtu.be/3JWiPFT0v2c
Jones did some pretty damn good blues covers too.
OK, that's good but also weird. It's like Al Jolson covering The Weavers or something.
Husker Du’s nuclear take on “Eight Miles High” always does it for me.
Could go so many ways with this one, but since I just heard it driving into work this morning and was blown away by it, I’ll go with To Know Him is to Love Him, by Amy Winehouse.
Or if you want to do You Tube videos, none’s better than Red Right Hand by The Diminished Minor Chord. https://youtu.be/TE5JPpzrSmE
MUCH prefer this to the original.
A friend sent me this a few weeks ago -
Glad they did!
https://youtu.be/G5q1mieAj9Y
Who the hell is this, she's great
Yah, dat's Inger Marie Gundersen
Dontcha know- she's Norwegian!
Seriously, she's excellent. There are a couple of albums on YT.
https://youtu.be/4yT568YEMwQ