In 2008, Los Angeles shoegaze-pop quartet Warpaint announced themselves in a big way with hyper-buzzy debut EP Exquisite Corpse. One of the tracks that most immediately grabbed listeners was “Billie Holiday,” which incorporated large sections of Smokey Robinson’s “My Guy” (not quite enough of a proper cover for our recent Best Smokey Covers list, but an honorable mention). Though never released as a single, the song is the band’s second-most-streamed on Spotify.
The band hasn’t released an album in four years, but bassist Jenny Lee Lindberg, who records as “jennylee,” just continued their dramatically-remade cover tradition. For an upcoming Record Store Day 7-inch, Lindberg recorded a cover of Fugazi’s “I’m So Tired.” Like “Billie Holiday,” it sounds far different than the original.
Now, if you’re not up on the complete Fugazi discography, their version does not sound like the punk you might expect: It’s a slow piano ballad. This no doubt contributed to it being one of the band’s most-covered songs, with people like Eddie Vedder playing it live. But I doubt there’s ever been a version like jennylee’s. She keeps it slow, but ditches the piano for a gradually-building band arrangement of bass and percussion.
In a press release, she said: “I love, admire and respect Fugazi with my whole heart… always have. The sentiment of ‘I’m so tired’ is deeply moving and extremely relatable. It was such a pleasure and a pleasant surprise I was able to pull this off. I hope I did it justice, it sure was FUN (and that’s the point of it all). Big love and kudos to Fugazi forever.”
I’m going bananas trying to figure out where I heard this song, or another cover version of it, in a movie or TV show recently and my Google-fu is failing me right now. I’m leaving this comment in the hopes one day someone finds it and knows what I’m talking about lol.