20. The Baseballs — Believe
The Baseballs are strangers neither to Cover Me, nor to our Best Covers Ever lists (see for yourself). What can we say? Something about the hits of today transformed into ’50s rockabilly by Germans with DA haircuts gets us where we live. If you’re familiar with their gimmick, you can imagine how “Believe” sounds. But I would argue that the song works as a throwback lyrically just as well as musically. The leather-clad tough guy with a permanently wounded heart was a ’50s trope before ’50s tropes were cool, and lines like “I’ve had time to think it through / And maybe I’m too good for you” would sound just as badass coming from Gene Vincent as they did from Cher. No upright bass slap could hide that. — Patrick Robbins
19. Sunstorm — Emotional Fire
In 1987, Michael Bolton released an album called The Hunger. Buried in the extensive personnel credits was backing singer Joe Lynn Turner, a hard-rock musician who’s logged time in Rainbow and Deep Purple. Years later, Turner formed a band called Sunstorm. On Sunstorm’s third album, 2012’s Emotional Fire, Turner paid tribute to his 1980s backing-vocalist days by covering a number of those songs he’d sung backup on.
“So wait,” you’re asking, “this is a Michael Bolton cover?” Well, it would have been. Bolton, who also co-wrote it with hitmaking giants Diane Warren and Desmond Child, recorded it for that 1987 album, but it didn’t make the final cut. Which meant that Cher’s version two years later on Heart of Stone became the de facto original version. (Turner didn’t sing backing vocals on Cher’s recording. But you know who did? Michael Bolton.)
A highly roundabout route to get to this cover. Sunstorm is in full ‘80s-Bon-Jovi mode here. It’s like a lost classic from the Sunset Strip. Or from Europe (the band, that is, not the continent). — Ray Padgett
18. Sheila — La tendresse d’un homme [Holdin’ Out for Love]
There has been much written over the years about the meritocracy of disco. If you could fill a dance floor, you became a star, Q.E.D.. Even if you had no track record, and other parts of the music industry were not interested in you. If you had the tunes you could get there, if the luck was with you. Equally, if you were an established star riding a wave, if you did the work and produced the goods, you would be welcomed. Cher’s disco albums with Casablanca were successful, and deserved to be.
Gallic diva Sheila, well established in Europe but unknown most other places, took her own detour into disco with this exquisite French language cover of “Holdin’ Out for Love.” It was clear that she had everything that you need to succeed. She then decided to move to the US, and try her hand there. Working with Bernard Edwards and Nile Rodgers of Chic and partnering with the mysterious “B. Devotion,” she produced a wonderful album featuring “Spacer,” one of the very greatest of disco floor-fillers and a worldwide hit. — Mike Tobyn
17. What Else (ft. Jim Babjak & Dennis Diken) — You Better Sit Down Kids
In 1991, an underground garage-rock tribute album was released called Bonograph: Sonny Gets His Share. It’s not all Sonny & Cher songs—Sonny Bono wrote songs for other artists, and had his own solo career (and I don’t mean of the Congressional variety)—but a lot of it is. Deep cuts, too. Best of the bunch is Jim Babjak & Dennis Diken of The Smithereens covering this divorce-themed Cher solo tune, but if you like this Nuggets sound (the spoken-word bit has definite “Moulty” energy), you’ll want to seek out the entire album. — Ray Padgett
16. King Creosote — Believe
Plaintive, but with panache. The Scottish vocal register is capable of many things, but it does sound great in the minor keys of music and life, and is suited to pathos. You can take a song which says “Your life is going to be worse because it does not contain me, and my life will be better because it does not contain you” and lovingly move it to “My life is going to missing something without you in it, and your life will not have me, but life goes on.” Not necessarily better, but potentially better, and that might be enough for me. — Mike Tobyn
15. UB40 ft. Chrissie Hynde — I Got You Babe
Chrissie Hynde heard UB40 in a pub and offered them the opening slot on the Pretenders’ 1980 tour. From that break, the British pop/reggae band, led by singer Ali Campbell, went on to significant worldwide success. Campbell and Hynde had discussed joining forces over the years, but it took until 1985 before Hynde guested on UB40’s cover of “I Got You Babe,” which was a No. 1 hit in the UK and made it to No. 28 in the US. It’s basically a reggae version of the song. Campbell’s voice is nicer than Sonny Bono’s, but is less distinctive, and Hynde actually sounds more than a little like Cher. It’s smooth and pleasant, like much of UB40’s output. — Adam Mason
14. Courage of Lassie — Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)
It takes more than the courage of a cinema dog to deconstruct such a well known song as this, ahead of rebuilding it as a doleful Eastern European lament. Courage of Lassie, in the late ’80s, briefly stood on the cusp of a breakthrough, basing their style on this and a similar folk-noir sensibility. With the nerve to lose the descending bass line and, shock horror, the chorus, they transformed the song into the weirdest song you’ll enjoy this October. The heart and lugubrious vocal of Ron Nelson melds, just about, with the eerie moan of Maddy Schenker. Utterly glorious. From Sing Or Die, and not even the best cover on the album. — Seuras Og
13. Barbi Benton — Dixie Girl
The Wikipedia entry begins: “Barbi Benton is an American former model, actress, television personality, and singer.” When “singer” is the fourth entry in that list, it doesn’t bode well. Nor does the very next sentence: “She appeared in Playboy magazine…” So color me surprised that her 1975 cover of “Dixie Girl” (released on Playboy’s record label, no less) is really good! Better than Cher’s own, in fact, which gets buried under syrupy strings. By recording the song as cosmopolitan country, Benton sound much more like an actual Dixie Girl. She recorded it with the highly credentialed house band of country-comedy show Hee Haw, which, as her Wiki also notes, she appeared on regularly. — Ray Padgett
12. Phantom Helmsmen — Gypsies, Tramps, and Thieves
More hard rock than folk tale, this cover might at first put a listener off guard with its electric guitar and heavy percussion that contrasts the lighter, almost tinkly instruments in the original. However, the life of a band member is perhaps not so different than the roaming lifestyle described by the song. The earnest delivery of the lyrics make it clear this isn’t a tongue-in-cheek cover, but rather a genre-bending one aiming to find unity across the performer experience more generally. — Sara Stoudt
11. Joshua Ray Walker — Believe
It feels like country covers of “Believe” are almost their own subgenre at this point (this isn’t even the first on this list!). Walker’s cover begins with some classic pedal steel immediately signaling that his is going to be one very countrified cover. But Walker’s vocals are even more traditional than the pedal steel, with a country croon from a bygone era. He matches it perfectly to the song’s vocal melody, where it feels like the song wasn’t written for autotune, but for a country voice that hints at, though never quite gets to, yodel. — Riley Haas
Thank you for the Cher Covers some wonderful renditions here Great work