That’s A Cover? explores cover songs that you may have thought were originals.
You all know the scene: a teenager who took the day off with a couple of his friends somehow ends up on a float in downtown Chicago, lip-synching The Beatles‘ “Twist and Shout” for the masses. And whenever the song comes up, someone inevitably says, “Actually, the Isley Brothers did it first.”
Except they didn’t.
That honor belongs to an almost-forgotten vocal group called The Top Notes.
Beatles tribute band The Weeklings have released their contribution to a new collection of Bob Dylan songs to be released by JEM Records. Their take of “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35” opens with (almost) acapella vocals and then quickly switches to a hard driving, slide-guitar version of the song, featuring a sing-along chorus. The song also takes a short detour into the opening verse of Dylan’s “Highway 61 Revisited.” Continue reading »
Green Day‘s Billie Joe Armstrong‘s side project, The Coverups, played a show in and included a David Bowie cover, featuring Iron Maiden‘s Bruce Dickinson. Continue reading »
Alexis Taylor of Hot Chip released an amazing electropop cover of “Wild Horses” earlier this year, and now he’s back with a similar take on Bonnie “Prince” Billy’s most-covered song. He writes, of the mesmerizing music video, “I saw the room that we see in the film — the scene, the two men facing each other and getting closer in their armchairs as the intensity of what they sing to each other increases. I saw the lady at the centre and back of the same space, illuminated by lamp light for the choruses, and the red balloon hovering over the 4 people in the scene. I wanted this to be like a televised Samuel Beckett play, and to be surreal, simple, and emotionally direct.”
It’s hard to do a fresh version of “Hotel California,” but Swiss duo Bandit Voyage pull it off on their new EP. They ditch many of the theatrics, stripping it down to sound more like a DIY indie-rock song. It’s The Eagles if they played a basement show. Eventually a hyper-distorted guitar does come in to play the closing solo, but even that feels done with a bit of a wink. Continue reading »
‘The Best Covers Ever’ series counts down our favorite covers of great artists.
This month marks the 55th anniversary of the death of Jim Morrison, the front man for the Doors. His importance in rock history, then as now, is a matter of debate – and there has been a lot of debate. Just this spring, BBC Music Magazine named the Doors the most overrated band in history, calling them “the ‘starter’ band for teenagers that one is supposed to outgrow.” Journalist Jimmy Guterman claimed that “Jimbo was a stillborn doggereler and an overwrought singer [and] his cohorts sounded like a group on loan from the local Econ-o-Lodge cocktail room.” Another critic called them “…yet another example of why one should always avoid people with messianic delusions.” And comedian Moshe Kasher says that “part of the process of becoming an adult is admitting to yourself that the Doors were a shitty band.”
But for every basher who makes merry of Morrison’s pretentious-shaman-in-leather-pants pose and calls his bandmates’ competence into question, you’ll find two who’ll defend them, in even more full-throated form than Morrison himself. The Sunset Boulevard Records label made an excellent post soon after the BBC put the Doors at number one:
The Doors have long occupied a strange position in rock history—too theatrical for purists, too serious for casual fans, and too iconic to ignore…. If anything, the renewed debate proves a simple point: truly irrelevant bands don’t inspire arguments nearly six decades after their debut. The Doors remain a lightning rod because they sit at the intersection of music, myth, and culture. Strip away Morrison’s legend, and you still have a band that redefined how rock could sound and feel. Embrace the legend, and you have one of the most enduring icons in popular music history. Either way, “overrated” might say less about The Doors—and more about the impossible standard we set for bands that refuse to fade quietly into the past.
Morrison, Ray Manzarek, Robbie Krieger, and John Densmore have spent the last sixty years not fading away. They may be polarizing to the world, but the four of them were unifying to each other. They created a sound based in blues, jazz, and flamenco, and their songs continue to bring attention on their own merits. We’ve found forty covers that demonstrate the worthiness of what the Doors brought to the world. They won’t end any debates – in fact, we expect them to start a few more in the comments section – but they’ll prove that the Doors and their music continue to be not just relevant, but as vivid, compelling, and preternatural as when they first arrived.
— Patrick Robbins
Features Editor
When you think of all the covers that Pavement would possibly consider play, anything from the Led Zeppelin songbook is probably pretty low down on the list. Which makes their cover of “Stairway to Heaven” at the pre-party for the Mosswood Meltdown Festival all the more surprising and unique. Continue reading »