Dec 182020
 

Follow all our Best of 2020 coverage (along with previous year-end lists) here.

Typically, the world of cover songs does not change that much year-to-year. You can point to big shifts across decades, sure, but the difference between cover songs in 2018 and 2019, broadly speaking? Negligible. But 2020 was – in this as in everything else – very different.

As concerts ground to a sudden halt, musicians turned to live-from-quarantine home performances, first on their social media, then, once some kind of business model got built up, on various paid platforms. And cover songs were a big part of that. Some musicians did themed covers nights, like Ben Gibbard on YouTube early on or Lucinda Williams’ more produced Lu’s Jukebox series more recently. Others just felt the freedom in such an intimate environment to try things out, spontaneously covering influences, inspirations, or even songs they only half knew. We collected dozens of those early home covers in our Quarantine Covers series, and still only hit a small fraction.

Musicians eventually settled in, and productions got a little more elaborate than the staring-at-your-iPhone-camera look. Witness the heavy metal comedy series Two Minutes to Late Night, which transitioned from a long-running live show in New York City to a series of YouTube covers with dozens of metal-scene ringers covering songs from their couches, corpse paint and all. Witness Miley Cyrus’s endless series of killer cover locales, from a fire pit to an empty Whisky a Go Go. Or witness long-running radio covers series like BBC’s Live Lounge or Triple J’s Like a Version – often the source of a song or two on these lists. First they had musicians tape special covers from home, then, in the BBC’s case, they moved to a giant warehouse studio for suitable social distancing. (Triple J’s pretty much back to post-coronavirus business as usual – sure, Australia, rub it in.)

There’s one other major way covers reflected 2020, and it’s almost too painful to think about, so I’ll just list their names. John Prine. Adam Schlesinger. Hal Willner. Charley Pride. So many musicians taken by this virus, many reflected in some of these covers (Pride’s death happened after our list was finalized, but tributes are already rolling in). In a year filled with tragedies, covers offered one place for musicians and fans to find solace.

Many of the songs on our year-end list reflect this terrible year in one way or another. But you know what? Many don’t. Because covers can also offer a fun respite from all the stress. Doom metal Doobie Brothers? Post Malone on mandolin? A viral TikTok hit by a guy who calls himself Ritt Momney? Those have nothing to do with anything! But they’re what we live for.

– Ray Padgett, Editor-in-Chief

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Sep 022020
 
Future Teens

“All Star” is both Smash Mouth’s most famous and most notorious song, featured in not one but two feature films (Mystery Men and Shrek) and subject of endless memes. The song’s restlessness positivity – despite the somewhat downbeat lyrics of the verses – has proved easy to mock, as has lead singer Steve Harwell’s distinct and unconventional voice. Still, it was a massive hit when it came out and it has become a radio staple in the subsequent decades.

Future teens are an indie pop band from Boston with a penchant for covers, releasing a covers album in 2018. Their vibe is a lot more mopey than Smash Mouth; they describe themselves as “bummer pop.” And they have covered the most unlikely of songs: “All Star.”

Their cover opens with co-lead singer Daniel Radin almost a cappella, with only the occasional tinkling of a piano. As the song builds, there is a distinct Counting Crows vibe, with the vocal melody altered to fit the vibe. Amy Hoffman, the other lead singer, takes over for the second verse, giving the song more of an emo/’00s indie pop vibe. Instead of the (in)famous whistle break, the band jam, which solidifies the ’00s indie rock sound. For the third verse most of the instrumentation breaks away, only to come back to build slowly to a brief climax complete with emo screaming before the final chorus’s grand finale.

The result ends up something like an indie or emo power ballad. It, needless to say, a complete re-imagining of the song. Listen below.