Goose Archives - Cover Me

The Best Who Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 8:00 am 7 Responses »

Aug 302024

‘The Best Covers Ever’ series counts down our favorite covers of great artists.

One of the things everyone enjoys about the Beatles is the band’s equality. Take John, Paul, George, or Ringo out of the equation, they say, and the magic is over. Well, the same is true for the Who (something they proved, sadly, after Keith Moon’s death). Only the Who were bigger. Louder. More proficient at their instruments of choice. They could be more powerful, but they could be more vulnerable too. They were one of the best studio bands of their time, and one of the best live bands of all time. And when they were at their peak, they could be the best band in the world.

Pete Townshend, Roger Daltrey, John Entwistle, and Keith Moon combined to form a force of nature. Starting as one of the great singles bands, they segued into being masters of the LP. Townshend led the way with pioneer guitar playing – both slashing power chords and controlled feedback were part of his palette before any other Guitar God – and a pen that produced not one but two full-length operas for the band (three, if you count the belatedly released Lifehouse), as well as three-minute expressions of defiant angst. Daltrey gave voice to that angst, developing a roar that could surf the wave of noise or blow through it. Entwistle may have looked stoic, but they called him Thunderfingers for a reason. His bass lines were nimble yet forceful, and his sense of the macabre in his songs gave the band even more colors. And what can be said about Moon and his drumming that hasn’t already been said?

The Who’s songs will remain long after they’re gone. Not just for the performances the Who gave them, but for the songs themselves. They conveyed anger, regret, humor, and more, searching low and high within their psyches. The stories they told were both theirs and ours. Here are thirty-five of those stories, telling those stories in ways that approach and occasionally surpass the band that created them.

– Patrick Robbins, Features Editor

The Best Vampire Weekend Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 9:00 am No Responses »

Jul 262024

‘The Best Covers Ever’ series counts down our favorite covers of great artists.

This spring, Vampire Weekend released their fifth album, Only God Was Above Us. Like all their albums, it was extremely well-received (“Universal acclaim,” says Metacritic), and they’re currently in the middle of a year-long tour supporting it. They take so long between albums that we wanted to strike while the iron was hot and celebrate some of the great covers of their work.

To state the obvious, five albums is not a huge discography. Last month we did The Kinks, and they’ve got 26 studio albums to cover songs from, and that’s not even counting all the non-album singles that include many of their biggest hits. But Vampire Weekend are beloved in a way few modern indie-rock bands are. So even though they don’t have that many songs, and even though they’re hardly in the game of making inescapable pop hits, they get covered a fair amount. And often in unexpected, inventive ways. Fitting for one of the most unexpected, inventive bands in the game.

Read on for our favorites.

Goose Combine “I Would Die 4 U” and Beverly Hills Cop Theme Live

Posted by Mike Tobyn at 9:00 am No Responses »

Nov 282023

The Festive Season is upon us, and jam-band fans know what that means: Goosemas. In preparation for their annual showcase in December, Goose played their first European tour in smaller venues and, in one case, on a moored boat. A portion of their devoted flock joined them, along with interested locals. During their first-ever show in Manchester, England, they played a cover, only their second, of Prince’s “I Would Die 4 U” with a new twist.

Of course, it is always an act of bravery to take on a Prince tune. To do it live when you know that this version exists, raises the stakes higher still. No trepidation shows. Opening the second set, Peter Anspach frames the piece with keyboards and then the band fill the scene, before Rick Mitarotonda takes on the improvisational duties. In a bravura performance, he goes through delicate phrasings and a panoply of power chords before something suddenly emerges.

Multiple listens do not give any hint of what is coming. If “Purple Rain” was one of the cultural phenomena of 1984, the surprise addition of “Axel F,” aka the theme to Beverly Hills Cop, was another. Bringing them together is something even Prince did not do.

Goose’s Manchester gig was one of the best-received on the tour and is available on Bandcamp.

Goose Jam Through Patriotic Debut of The Dead’s “US Blues”

Posted by Mike Tobyn at 12:00 pm No Responses »

Jul 172023

We recently wrote about how one chapter in the history of jam bands was ending, with the final show of Dead and Company (see: The 30 Best Grateful Dead Covers Ever). In another chapter, though, Norwalk, CT, based indie groove specialists Goose continue to write their own story. They have a close relationship with the Dead’s fanbase and have been joined by Bob Weir on occasion. They have covered many artists, across genres, but have made a specialty of Dead songs. The first appearance of “US Blues” came on the Stone Pony Summer Stage at Asbury Park on Independence Day. Continue reading »

The Best Covers of 1980s One Hit Wonders

Posted by Staff at 2:00 pm 3 Responses »

Jun 302023

‘The Best Covers Ever’ series counts down our favorite covers of great artists.

Is the 1980s the best decade ever for one-hit wonders? So many classic songs came out that decade by not-so-classic bands. It was, perhaps, a particularly fickle time to be chasing pop-chart success. Many of the oft-discussed one hit wonder bands have killer catalogs, but, for whatever reason, those catalogs contain only one tune that is widely remembered today. If you like “Take on Me” or “Safety Dance,” check out the respective A-Ha and Men Without Hats albums they came from, both just as good! The same holds true for many other ’80s bands. Dead or Alive, pictured above, has some other killer jams too, but alas, these days they’re best known as the “you spin me right round” band.

So today, we celebrate the big one-off hits in new wave, synth-rock, easy listening, and other very-’80s genres with some knockout covers. From “867-5309/Jenny” (Tommy Tutone) to “Turning Japanese” (The Vapors) to “In a Big Country” (Big Country — maybe hard to follow-up a hit that has your band name in the title). Rock down to Electric Avenue, and let these covers take you higher.
Continue reading »

The Best Covers of 1950s One Hit Wonders

Posted by Staff at 9:00 am 2 Responses »

May 052023

‘The Best Covers Ever’ series counts down our favorite covers of great artists.

As regular readers know, every month we put together a giant list we call Best Covers Ever. We take a household-name artist and count down the best covers of their songs. We’ve done Bob Dylan and Beyoncé and Billy Joel and Bee Gees and Britney Spears and Beach Boys and Bruce Springsteen and Buddy Holly and those are just the B’s.

What do all of those “B” artists have in common? Not much, except for this: They all have a lot of different songs that get covered by a lot of different people.

But there are some artists who will likely never get their own list here. Why not? Maybe they just don’t get covered enough. Or maybe they get covered often — but people mostly just cover a single song. These are the artists we colloquially call One Hit Wonders. And in a special series starting today, we’re celebrating covers of their songs. Continue reading »