Melvins Archives - Cover Me

The 75 Best Beatles Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 9:00 am 23 Responses »

Feb 232024

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

Sixty years ago this month, The Beatles played on the Ed Sullivan Show. You don’t need us to tell you what a momentous occasion this was; entire books have been written on the subject. Suffice to say we’re using the anniversary as our excuse to finally devote a Best Covers Ever to perhaps the biggest band of them all. We’ve done Dylan. We’ve done the Stones. We’ve done Dolly and Springsteen and Prince. But there was one last giant remaining.

Though it’s difficult to measure this precisely, The Beatles are the most-covered artist of all time according to the two biggest covers databases on the internet (SecondHandSongs, WhoSampled). And that certainly feels right. “Yesterday” is often cited as the most-covered song of all time, though that needs qualifiers (a ton of Christmas standards would beat it). But, again, it feels right. The Beatles were ubiquitous in their day, and they’ve been ubiquitous ever since. They just had a chart-topping single last month, the A.I.-assisted “Now and Then,” which was duly covered widely. If “Carnival of Light” ever surfaces, no doubt a carnival of covers will soon follow. Continue reading »

The 50 Best Paul McCartney Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 8:43 am 1 Response »

Jun 182022

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

There are a lot of weird and wacky images within Alan Aldridge’s 1969 cult classic book The Beatles Illustrated Lyrics. One of the most memorable is a drawing imagining what John, Paul, George, and Ringo will look like as senior citizens. In this fantastical portrait, John and George are depicted as eccentric elders. Ringo, in keeping with his everyman persona, is shown as a shopworn sad sack. But it is Paul McCartney who offers the most disturbing vision of the future. “The cute one” appears as a conservative besuited and well-fed bank manager. His smug grin suggests he is proud to have finally outgrown all that silly pop music nonsense. Continue reading »

The 40 Best Cars Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 9:00 am 3 Responses »

Feb 252022

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

There’s plenty of good reasons that the Cars and their songs have retained their power long past the expiration date of most new wave bands. For one, though their cool-geek look was a part of their appeal, they never relied on it the way other bands had to rely on their appearance. For another, they brought together multiple influences – rock, pop, synth, punk – and created a sound with deep roots that was both edgy and fresh – no mean feat, that.

Most importantly, the songs that (mostly) Ric Ocasek and Benjamin Orr wrote for the band were strong and memorable, loaded with hooks and containing lyrics that take on more meaning the more you look at them – is “You’re All I’ve Got Tonight” a positive or negative? What does it mean if you “needed someone to bleed”?

Their self-titled debut album is their strongest, and Heartbeat City may be their biggest, but the Cars are primarily known as a singles band, with over a dozen of them reaching the top 40. So it seems appropriate that a list of the best Cars covers should echo that. Here are the top forty cover songs of a band whose best songs won’t be tied down to any one era, preferring instead to resonate to all the generations that followed.

clap clap clapclapclap clapclapclapclap Let’s go!

– Patrick Robbins, Features Editor

Full Albums: Neil Young’s ‘Zuma’

Posted by Seuras Og at 1:30 pm No Responses »

Sep 042020

Full Albums features covers of every track off a classic album. Got an idea for a future pick? Leave a note in the comments!

Was Zuma the album that finally allowed Neil Young to ditch the encumbrance of being just the fourth name in a list of four?

Before the cloud fills with angry retorts, exhorting Shakey’s eternal place as King of the Gods, back down a little and let me explain.

For sure Young was huge before Zuma‘s 1975 release, that’s obvious, but he wasn’t, how you say, massive. Young made his name in Buffalo Springfield, alongside Stephen Stills; on that band’s implosion, their solo recordings each got notice and were garnished with praise. Stills arguably leapt ahead when he teamed up with Crosby and Nash, even if it then took Young joining to make the supergroup a superlative group. Fast forward past the post-Four Way Street wreckage: Manassas was giving Stills some huge credibility, and Young was in need of a band. Of course, he already had one, but they were arguably just background noise up until this point. Nerds (yes, that’s us) knew all about Crazy Horse and possibly had their separate records, but only with Zuma did Young bring them in the forefront and put them in sizable writing on the cover.

I would assert that this made the difference, catapulting Young ahead his onetime partner. Manassas may have had all the classy talent, but the Horse had pure, um, horsepower. Never again would Stills equal his rival, no matter how long he may run. Young didn’t even need the Horse to maintain his pole position, but, give or take the International Harvesters or Promise of the Real, Booker T’s MGs even, it seems only with these guys does Neil really fly. Unless, paradoxically, he is entirely alone.
Continue reading »

Five Good Covers: “Rebel Girl” (Bikini Kill)

Posted by Sara Stoudt at 2:30 pm No Responses »

Sep 022019

Five Good Covers presents five cross-genre reinterpretations of an oft-covered song.

2019 marks the return of the riot grrrl. Bikini Kill, Sleater-Kinney, L7, and Team Dresch, all formative riot grrrl bands, have reunited in 2019 to play tours and (in some cases) even release new music. In the era of the #MeToo movement, increasing abortion restrictions, and the struggles of the LGBTQ community to find acceptance, riot grrrls sense that they are needed, and they’re coming back. The riot grrrl movement was a punk musical movement, but it was also a political movement; lyrics took on weighty topics, promoted feminism, and unabashedly commented on politics. This week we celebrate riot grrls, and thank them for speaking up and pushing for equality through their music.

It only seems right to kick off a week of riot grrrl posts with Bikini Kill, often considered the founding band of the movement. Founded in Olympia, Washington, home to the early riot grrrl scene, in 1990, the band is made up of singer Kathleen Hanna, drummer Toby Vail, guitarist Billy Karren, and bassist Kathi Wilcox. Before disbanding in 1997, Bikini Kill recorded five albums, demanding “girls to the front” at their shows. Afterwards, the members went on to other musical projects. Most notably, Hanna became part of Le Tigre, the rock band known for its liberal political statements. Ironically, Hillary Clinton’s campaign tried to use “Rebel Girl” in a campaign video, but Vail requested that it be removed.

In 2006, when Rolling Stone picked the best songs of each year since 1967, Bikini Kill’s “Rebel Girl” was deemed the best of 1993. But this song is not just a song for the ’90s (not to mention a refreshing break from heteronormative lyrics), it’s an emblem, an anthem for everyone fighting injustice in this world.

When she talks, I hear the revolution
In her hips, there’s revolution
When she walks, the revolution’s coming
In her kiss, I taste the revolution

These covers span the spectrum from screaming to singing, and they choose a variety of tempos marked by a steady metronomic drum beat.

The Best Cover Songs of July

Posted by Ray Padgett at 3:15 pm 3 Responses »

Jul 312019

Check out the best covers of past months here.

Anais Mitchell & The Staves – Strong Enough (Sheryl Crow cover)

For a few years now, long-running French video company La Blogothèque has been filming a series they call “One to One” at Bon Iver’s various European festivals. They blindfold one audience member and bring them into a private room for a concert for one. Bon Iver did one, and Damien Rice’s is a must-watch. Personally, that experience sounds more awkward than enjoyable – especially with all the cameras in your face – so I’d rather just watch someone else’s personal concert on video. This one is a gem, feature The Staves with Anais Mitchell delivering a gorgeously-harmonized Sheryl Crow cover. Continue reading »