This Week on Bandcamp rounds up our favorite covers to hit the site in the past seven days.
Lots of nostalgia today. Three hits from yesteryear mingle with two more recent songs. If anything though, the more recent songs recall even heavier memories, as both the original artists passed away in their prime. Remember songwriters who left us too soon as well as those who trundle on with today’s selection.
With little fanfare, Rhode Island’s 75orLess Records released a 39-track cover album for free on Bandcamp this week. As you might expect with such a mammoth volume, the quality is hit or miss. The hits, though, hit hard. This tasty alt-rock version of Ben E. King’s sentimental classic gives you a taste.
As one of the artists alluded to in the intro, Sparklehorse’s Mark Linkous committed suicide on March 6, 2010. To honor the one-year anniversary of his death, Dutch quintet Pondertone covered this 1998 track with plenty of xylophone. If you’re wondering where that doomsday monologue that closes the piece comes from, it’s from the 1936 H.G. Wells film Things to Come.
Soul singer Alison Cecile Johns has been steadily releasing Bandcamp covers all year. In January she released a tribute to Stevie Wonder and since has been steadily covering songs she loves in her simply-titled Covers set. Her latest, of Elvis Costello’s “Everyday I Write the Book,” proves her best yet. Note: As occasionally happens on Bandcamp, it costs money to download the individual track, but downloading the entire album is free. Go figure.
Are cello covers a new trend? We sure hope so! We’ve recently heard cello covers of Kanye West and Led Zeppelin and now we get some Pink Floyd. Accompanied only by a flamenco-tinged guitar, this swaying instrumental will get your blood pumping.
The final track on Elliott Smith’s posthumous album From a Basement on the Hill, “A Distorted Reality Is Now a Necessity to Be Free” is here introduced with a Smith quote from a Swedish interview. Thus begins an indie thumping cover that illustrates what we never thought possible: Elliott Smith works with AutoTune.
Which is your favorite? Comment below, then check out previous installments here.
