Sep 012020
 

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

Bette Davis Eyes cover

Yesterday we learned that Kim Carnes was not the first to sing about Bette Davis’s eyes. Jackie DeShannon kicked off the admiration six years earlier. Despite this, Carnes’s version is the one we typically think of with its distinctive synth opener and its punctuating claps throughout.

These five covers keep the Bette Davis fan club going and bring their own approach to the Carnes version. Some combine similar elements; others go a completely different route. All are good, so let’s “turn the music on you” and listen to (more) covers of “Bette Davis Eyes.”
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May 082015
 

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

logical

Written by Supertramp’s Roger Hodgson (with an assist on the second chorus’s vocal harmony by Rick Davies), “The Logical Song” not only has more words of three or more syllables (twenty-seven!) than some bands have in their entire discography; it also has a warning about using schooling as a brickbat that resonates even more post-No Child Left Behind. Plus which, that saxophone break would send any contemporaries whimpering their way back to Baker Street. It was the band’s biggest hit off their biggest album, Breakfast in America; that unforgettable cover model, Kate Murtagh, is 94 and still going, much like “The Logical Song” itself.
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Nov 162012
 

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

Nick Laird-Clowes had become friends with Paul Simon. One day he played Simon a chorus that had yet to find verses or a bridge; Simon told him that if he could build a song around it, he’d have a hit. “What are you going to call it – ‘Ah Hey Ma Ma Ma’?” Simon asked. Laird-Clowes said no, it would be called “Morning Lasted All Day.” Simon shot that down. After giving it some more thought, Laird-Clowes asked how “Life in a Northern Town” sounded; Simon said it was a great title, and the rest is what we here at Cover Me like to call history. Continue reading »