Quickies: Well Hung Heart, Matt Bauer, Petula, Wampire, Francesca Vannucci

Quickies rounds up new can’t-miss covers. Download ‘em below.

• Unsubtle band name notwithstanding, L.A. duo Well Hung Heart show a surprising delicacy on their Huey Lewis and the News cover. Recorded for Syffal’s Pop Cultures Collide series, it reinvents the Back to the Future smash.
MP3: Well Hung Heart – The Power of Love (Huey Lewis and the News cover)

• Brooklyn songwriter Matt Bauer released his fourth album The Jessamine County Book of the Living earlier this month and, to celebrate, delivered this outtake to Hitfix. It’s a simple country-folk acoustic lament, with a hint of xylophone in the background.
MP3: Matt Bauer – Hammer Down (Magnolia Electric Co. cover)

• Every month the Music Alliance Pact (MAP) creates a mix with songs from bloggers repping 36 different countries. Germany’s entry this month comes from Blogpartei, delivering a scratchy off-kilter pop homage to an obscure Savoy Grand song.
MP3: Petula – Wives (Savoy Grand cover)

• The world needs more Kraftwerk covers. Last year’s rodeo-country version of “Pocket Calculator” offered a refreshing reinvention of the Krautrock pioneers and Wampire attempts the same. It’s a little more faithful in that it actually uses synthesizers, but earns bonus points for sticking with the original German.
MP3: Wampire – Das Modell (Kraftwerk)

• An opera singer doing Radiohead may seem overwrought, and it some ways it is. Still, Francesca Vannucci finds the heart of the song without resorting to unnecessary theatrics.
MP3: Francesca Vannucci – All I Need (Radiohead cover)

Check out more Quickies here.