Aug 182014
 

Sam Amidon has built a career out of taking traditional folk, blues and Appalachian tunes and modernizing them. Although he occasionally strays into pop culture (his version of R. Kelly’s “Relief” was Cover Me’s 2nd favorite cover song of 2010) he can typically be found playing some obscure tune of long-forgotten origin. The first release from his upcoming album, Lily-O, fits the bill. Continue reading »

Aug 162014
 

They Say It’s Your Birthday celebrates an artist’s special day with other people singing his or her songs. Let others do the work for a while. Happy birthday!

Forgive me, Father for I have sinned.

It has been….a really long time since my last confession. My sins are multitudinous (lust, blasphemy, coveting my neighbor’s ass… but in my defense, it’s a really nice ass), but the most egregious of all is idolatry.

See, ever since I could sway to music, Madonna has been my idol. The long-established Queen of my Universe and a musician I just can’t quit despite her numerous attempts to break my heart (that horrible faux English accent, sleeping with Vanilla Ice, sleeping with Vanilla Ice and then documenting it in her Sex book…).

I didn’t grow up Catholic, so I couldn’t seek solace in the open arms of Holy Mother Church. Instead, I sought solace from a leonine-eyed beauty who often incited the ire of the Catholic Church.

Madonna taught me lessons that have carried me through adolescence and well into adulthood.
Continue reading »

Aug 132014
 

Yoodoo Park, also known by his stage name GRMLN, started making music to drive around to while cruising around Santa Cruz and San Francisco during the summer of his seventeenth year. The 21-year-old California native has brought a lo-fi mentality to Cyndi Lauper‘s classic ballad, “Time After Time.” Continue reading »

Aug 122014
 

“Ceremony” is known in most music fans knowledge as the song that bridged Joy Division’s transition to New Order following the death of the former’s frontman. As one of the last songs Ian Curtis wrote, there are recordings of Joy Division performing it but there is sadly not a fully realised studio version out there. Continue reading »

Aug 112014
 

“Wharf Rat” is an interesting song within the vast canon of the Grateful Dead. First performed in 1971 and included on numerous live recordings, it was never released as a studio track. The lyrics recount the tale of the singer meeting an old man, down and out, who then becomes the storyteller. This storyteller approach was later used by lyricist Robert Hunter in the multipart “Terrapin Station.” Musically, the song is not complex, but it features different sections and tempos, abandoning conventional verse and chorus format. Continue reading »