Jun 302022
 
best covers of june 2022
Angel Olsen – Greenville (Lucinda Williams cover)


Angel Olsen dropped two terrific covers this month. Her version of Dylan’s “One Too Many Mornings,” recorded for the TV show Shining Girls, features haunting electronic textures underpinning her voice. It’s a surprisingly un-folky cover of one of Bob’s early folk songs. Her version of Lucinda Williams’ Car Wheels on a Gravel Road standout “Greenville” is just as good, guitar echoing behind her mesmerizing double-tracked vocals. Continue reading »

Sep 222021
 
jk snow

Imagine Dragons’ recent single “Follow You” sounds like, well, an Imagine Dragons song (though the music video is worth a watch for Always Sunny fans). But Marshall Islands-born singer JK Snow, now living in Mexico, heard something beneath the gleaming pop-rock production. In a gorgeous new cover – her debut single, no less – she turns the song into a torch ballad. Her layered vocals and synth lines will captivate even Imagine Dragons detractors.

“I really connected with the lyrics of Follow You and I felt emotional about them, loving someone so much that you are willing to follow them to their deepest lows and wanting to put them in the sunlight,” Snow said, “But I heard the song differently in my head and wanted to express the moody, heart-wrenching love song I heard underneath the big pop production.

Check out Snow’s “Follow You” below.

Follow JK Snow on YouTube or Instagram to hear future music.

Jan 102020
 

Five Good Covers presents five cross-genre reinterpretations of an oft-covered song.

hand in my pocket covers

As 2020 gets off to a rocky start, if you “haven’t got it all figured out just yet,” that is okay. Alanis Morissette is back to remind us that “everything’s gonna be fine, fine, fine” with a (super relatable) new single, the promise of a new album in May, a new tour featuring guests Garbage and Liz Phair (“all I really want” is a ticket to that show), and the debut of the Broadway musical based on her iconic album, Jagged Little Pill. That album, her international debut, won five Grammys and made Morissette the first Canadian to have an album go double diamond (selling 20 million copies). Here are just a few albums that Jagged Little Pill has sold more copies than: The Beatles’s Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and Abbey Road, Bruce Springsteen’s Born in the U.S.A., and Nirvana’s Nevermind. Not bad!

A New York Times Magazine feature by Rachel Syme sets the scene for the release of the album:

The riot grrrl ethos was “girls to the front” — a communal taking up space — while Morissette’s was more like “girls to your car,” where you could process your baggage in private. One was like being at a protest, and the other is like being in therapy — different impulses, but both about making conscious changes.

The album hasn’t yet been featured on Pitchfork’s Sunday Reviews, but it is destined to be. Hit me up, Pitchfork Editorial Staff, I’m happy to do it.

“Hand In My Pocket,” the second single off of the album, followed another classic, “You Oughta Know.” It was Morissette’s first number one single in Canada, but it did not make the Hot 100 in the USA (it was never released as a CD single there, though it posted high on other US charts). These five artists appreciate the song’s depth, paying their homage via a cover. And to all of you musicians out there, keep the Alanis covers coming! I dream of a Full Albums post for Jagged Little Pill.

Continue reading »

Aug 302013
 

In terms of giant, anthemic songs that have come out in the last year, few are as in-your-face as Imagine Dragons’ “Radioactive.” It’s a giant song with intensely dark undertones that get somewhat lost in the shuffle of the hugeness of the song itself – the electronic sounds, power vocals and action-movie beats. Continue reading »