Feb 112025
 
courtney barnett lotta love

Courtney Barnett is among a group of musicians who are contributing Neil Young covers to a new album to raise money for The Bridge School. The album is titled is the first of two and titled Heart of Gold: The Songs of Neil Young. On top of Barnett, it will include contributions by musicians Eddie Vedder, Fiona Apple, Brandi Carlile and others.

Barnett covers Young’s “Lotta Love,” which first appeared on Young’s 1978 album, Comes a Time. In the press release, Barnett said of the song and Young, “‘Lotta Love’ is one of my favourite Neil songs and the lyrics feel especially relevant at this moment in history. It’s a real honour to be part of this tribute helping to raise funds for The Bridge School.” Continue reading »

Feb 032025
 
best cover songs
abazaba ft. Eugene Hütz — Isolation (Joy Division cover)

Adam Granduciel, Sharon Van Etten — Abandoned Love (Bob Dylan cover)

Continue reading »

Dec 182024
 

The name Brigid Mae Power may be unfamiliar, as well may be many of the songs on her newest album, Songs for You. At least in these iterations. Those already familiar with Ms. Power will need no such prompting, mind, and may just need a pointer towards Songs for You‘s existence.

A quick bio for the novices: Of London Irish stock, Power’s family relocated back home to Kilkenny when she was 11. She produced a ream of self-released EPs between 2010 and 2014, catching the ear of the Irish media, who found her ethereal vocal style possessed a “spiritual resonance.” After meeting Peter Broderick, the US roots singer and multi-instrumentalist, at a gig, he took her to his home studio in Portland, OR, and he produced her international debut, following which a further three albums have appeared, each gathering increasing acclaim. She has since married. But Songs for You has a special extra resonance, in that it is dedicated to the memory of her father.

Anyone attending shows or festivals in the UK over the last 40 years, particularly in London, will be familiar with the name Vince Power, the sometimes controversial figure who opened the Mean Fiddler venue in 1982. With ambition to celebrate both Americana and folk music, particularly Irish, he certainly achieved that. His fiefdom swiftly expanded, as a welter of other clubs opened, and before long his eyes were on the burgeoning festival circuit. In his time he had responsibility for an astonishing roster that included turning around the fortunes of Reading and Leeds, having a say in Glastonbury and setting up his own Phoenix and Hop Farm festivals, amongst many, many others. This included the “chain” of Fleadh festivals worldwide, devoted to a celebration of the Irish in music. Quite a fella, he died in March of this year, remembered to many as the “Godfather of gigs.”

Now his daughter has picked artists that her father held in regard, guaranteeing their ongoing presence on a world stage via his promotions. Largely playing solo, with some bass and drums from Shahzad Ismaily and Ryan Jewell respectively, it makes for both a fitting tribute to her dad and a further introduction to her own haunting vocal style.
Continue reading »

Dec 162024
 

Baskery have never been shy of their influences, with the Swedish sisters indebted to the “file under country and folk” of North America. Although they self-describe their music as “killbilly”, or banjo punk, the reality is that they are a world apart from any of the frantic fringes of cowpunk, a closer reference point being maybe as an amalgam of the (Dixie) Chicks and the Roches. It is a good brew, though, and their previous releases contain a melodic fusion of country rock tropes. Greta Bondesson manages to combine playing drums with a guitar/banjo hybrid, with sister Stella playing bass and sister Sunniva handling guitars and cello. All sing, their sibling harmonies a characteristic feature. As well as playing all the instruments, the three usually write their own songs. However, The Young Sessions – Live to Tape sees them doing a cover album, selecting ten Neil Young tracks to cover, most of them from his 1969-1972 peak.
Continue reading »

Dec 042024
 

One Great Cover looks at the greatest cover songs ever, and how they got to be that way.

Neil Young rarely records other people’s songs. In live appearances it’s another story–he seems game to cover anything–but in the studio it’s Neil Young material that Neil wants to record. One exception to the rule is ”Four Strong Winds” by Ian & Sylvia from 1963. Young recorded his own version for his Comes a Time album (1978). It’s not just any old cover–it’s one great cover with special meaning to Young himself.
Continue reading »

Nov 222024
 

In the Spotlight showcases a cross-section of an artist’s cover work. View past installments, then post suggestions for future picks in the comments!

As tradition has it, the jazz singer usually comes with piano accompaniment. Often, as with Diana Krall or Nina Simone or Norah Jones, the crooner is the keyboardist. The deep-voiced vocalist Cassandra Wilson broke this template back in the 90s. Her most successful music centers on the acoustic guitar, and features acoustic stringed instruments as main ingredients in the mix. If this unusual sonic palette makes Wilson’s music stand out, what makes it stick is her embrace of genres outside the jazz idiom.

Wilson first gained recognition in the mid-1980s as a founding member of the avant-garde M-Base collective. M-Base artists explored intricate rhythmic layering, free improvisation, and absorbing various African and African-American musical traditions, including newer branches like hip-hop. But Wilson soon struck off in her own direction, issuing several albums under her own name. Then she transformed her approach, and in 1992 she signed on with Blue Note Records (EMI).

It was at this point she expanded beyond jazz standards (and her own compositions) by covering folk, country, Delta blues, and pop material. From Hank Williams to U2, The Monkees to Van Morrison, Muddy Waters to Joni Mitchell, she was on it. At the same time, she began to feature instruments that were largely excluded from the jazz bandstand: classical guitars, octave guitars, resonators, banjos, a violin, a bouzouki, and a mandocello. Wilson redefined what jazz could sound like. She partnered with individualistic musicians (like Brandon Ross, Kevin Breit, and Charlie Burnham) all phenomenal artists who could play with imagination and with extended techniques. When Wilson herself played guitar it was usually in a “wack tuning” (to quote her own liner notes).

Not one to cling to a format or formula, she continued to evolve beyond her breakthrough Blue Note records (she left the label entirely in 2010). She even brought piano back into the mix, bringing to light some the best players of the next generation, including a young unknown named Jon Batiste. In some phases she focused on musical forms from Italy and from Brazil, or veered back into a more mainstream jazz approach, as on projects with Wynton Marsalis (the Pulitzer-prize winning Blood on the Fields production) and album-length tributes to Miles Davis and Billie Holiday. In the current decade Wilson’s been very quiet. She turns 70 in 2025, and if we are lucky she will re-emerge with more of her beguiling music to share.

Cassandra Wilson – Love Is Blindness (U2 cover)

Bono wrote this song for Nina Simone. Maybe that’s why it feels so fully realized when Cassandra Wilson sings it. I love the harmonics Kevin Breit plays on his resonator throughout this piece, and I love Wilson’s reading of the last line of the bridge: “Baby, a dangerous idea that almost makes sense”–how she starts off soaring and then downshifts to end so confidingly and with a hint of mischief. But what sends the song over the edge (no pun intended, none at all) is what follows that line, the cornet solo by Butch Morris. It’s strange, and yearning, and perfectly set up by his earlier playing behind the verses. Later the cornet mimics–with three or four notes–water droplets hitting the bottom of the deep well Bono wrote about. After a hundred listens, I never noticed them until just now.

Cassandra Wilson – Redemption Song (Bob Marley cover)

In the iconic version of “Redemption Song,” Bob Marley performs this anthem on his own, just the man and his guitar. Wilson follows suit, though she leaves the guitar work to Brandon Ross. Marley’s message is so clear and strong, understatement is called for. No one knows this better than Ross, whose playing and arrangements are always full of space and eloquent restraint.

Cassandra Wilson – Vietnam Blues (J.B. Lenoir cover)

Wilson grew up near the Mississippi Delta region where the delta blues originated, and she has been unique among jazz artists in her eagerness to engage with the form. She’s covered early bluesmen like Son House, Robert Johnson (twice), Muddy Waters, and Mississippi Fred McDowell. Here she covers a performer less well known even to blues fans, J.B. Lenoir. His “Vietnam Blues” is characteristic of his politically-charged take on the form. (It was fine for jazz artists and folk artists to meld their music with political protest, but for blues artists–not so much.) Wilson’s somber take on this weighty material is countered by the antics of her soloists (Martin Sewell and Kevin Breit) who take their licks and tricks to the edge of chaos. This recording was on the soundtrack to the Wim Wenders blues documentary The Soul of a Man.

Cassandra Wilson – Harvest Moon (Neil Young cover)

Lullaby-quiet and improbably slow, Wilson’s “Harvest Moon” still operates at extremes. The bassist bows the lowest note on the instrument, a long drone that never decays, while the resonator guitarist brings out the highest-pitched notes his instrument is capable of. (He does it by plinking the strings below and above the fretboard where you are not supposed to play.) The instruments establish a dusky mood and texture. A metal slide quivers against guitar strings in a wavering buzz, a sound akin to the chorus of crickets that opens and closes the track. Cassandra purrs out each line at her leisure, spacing each word just so. She strays so far from the original that it becomes a song of her own, not simply a Neil Young cover.

Cassandra Wilson – Skylark (Hoagy Carmichael cover)

This 1941 pop tune became a jazz standard that every singer has wanted a part of, from Ella Fitzgerald to Samara Joy. (Did you know “Skylark” is about Judy Garland? She was nineteen at the time, and lyricist Johnny Mercer was in love with her.) Wilson’s somewhat overlooked arrangement features the haunting pedal steel guitar of Gib Wharton–really, he is singing in tandem with Wilson through his instrument. And what a duet it is. Wharton was never part of the “sacred steel” movement but he brings the emotive element from that tradition into his free-ranging approach. Like everyone Wilson plays with, he sidesteps cliche and gets to what’s true, fresh, and gorgeous.

Cassandra Wilson – ‘Til There Was You (Meredith Willson/Beatles cover)

Composer Meredith Wilson had a long and storied career, from scoring Charlie Chaplin feature films to writing a Christmas song you know by heart. But for many, he’s only known for his 1957 Broadway musical The Music Man; for many more he’s only known as a song the Beatles covered. (Paul McCartney didn’t know it was a show tune when he learned the Peggy Lee cover from 1959.)

Cassandra Wilson doesn’t have the range of Peggy Lee or Paul McCartney and doesn’t need it. She has timing and feel on her side and, in this live version, a conversational tone. The ballad is a curious pick for a show closer, but what redeems it is Wilson’s ceding the stage to her young and largely unknown pianist, Jon Batiste. It’s a nice touch that after he solos, Batiste himself then leaves the stage so that the percussionist can play us out.

Cassandra Wilson – For the Roses (Joni Mitchell cover)

Joni Mitchell’s music made a lasting impact on Cassandra Wilson when Wilson was growing up in Mississippi. You can hear some of the influence in Wilson’s own lyrics, which often reach the pure poetry of the kind Joni had such a gift for. Musically, maybe it’s from Joni that Cassandra got into “wack tunings.” In this song about the dark sides of fame and success, you can hear that Wilson relates. “They start bringing in the hammers, and the boards and the nails” she sings with particular conviction. In addition to “For the Roses,” which was Wilson’s contribution to a Joni Mitchell tribute album from 2007, Wilson also covered Joni’s “Black Crow” on her first Blue Note release, Blue Light ‘Til Dawn.

Cover Me is now on Patreon! If you love cover songs, we hope you will consider supporting us there with a small monthly subscription. There are a bunch of exclusive perks only for patrons: playlists, newsletters, downloads, discussions, polls – hell, tell us what song you would like to hear covered and we will make it happen. Learn more at Patreon.