Nouvelle Vague Archives

Five Good Covers: “Blue Monday” (New Order)

Posted by Seuras Og at 11:00 am 4 Responses »

Feb 142022

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

“Blue Monday” is feels too darn recent to be almost 40 years old. That may be due to the number of times it has been re-released, each time never outstaying the welcome the immediately discernible intro offers. Which is one of the problems, but we’ll get to that.

New Order, having emerged phoenix-like from the ashes of Joy Division and the suicide of frontman Ian Curtis, appeared to have hit the ground running with the iconic “Blue Monday.” But it was actually a year or two into their formation, 1983, earlier recordings having been more akin to the maudlin gloomcore of their earlier incarnation. Only after a wider exposure to techno and house music, along with the absorption of synthesist Gillian Gilbert into the band, did they have the conviction to fully embrace and add such textures to their existing sound.

“Blue Monday” epitomized where guitars and dance music might meet, making for a new breed of visceral electronica, with some organic frailty heightening the robotic artifice. The biggest selling 12″ single ever made, it remains a perpetual in the live repertoire on the still functioning band, who, according to setlist.fm, have played it 448 times in their 41 year history.

There are more covers of this song than you might expect. Broadly, they fall into two categories: the copycat, identifiable in seconds from the staccato drums, and the ambient acoustic deconstruction. They make up, between them, well over half the field available. The former seems sort of pointless and the latter, well… Much as I love that style, they are all a bit samey and a bit, given they are mostly Gallic in origin, vieux chapeau, which made the decision for me that they would not be included here. (Except, in passing, the one by Nouvelle Vague.)

No, I like my Blue Mondays to stand out. Like these five here…
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The Best Depeche Mode Covers Ever

Posted by Staff at 1:00 pm 11 Responses »

Nov 062020

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

Way back in January, we polled our Patreon supporters to see which 2020 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee they wanted to see get the “Best Covers Ever” treatment. Depeche Mode won, so we started planning our schedule to get it ready in advance of the big induction ceremony on March 24.

Then…you know.

Tomorrow, many months later, the Rock Hall is finally hosting some sort of ceremony – remotely, of course – and we’ve been honoring each artist all week with covers features: Whitney Houston, Notorious B.I.G., The Doobie Brothers, T. Rex, and Nine Inch Nails. Now, many months after we expected to post it, the grand finale: The 25 Best Depeche Mode Covers Ever. Continue reading »

Five Good Covers: “Golden Brown” (The Stranglers)

Posted by Seuras Og at 2:00 pm 8 Responses »

May 072020

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

I remember the joy with which I first heard “Golden Brown” by the Stranglers. It sounded nothing quite like anything going on in the charts at the time: a harpsichord and a hypnotic, repetitive melody, played in peculiar and shifting, almost conflicting, time signatures. Then a gentle crooning vocal, singing about… well, what was it about?
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Cover Me Q&A: What’s your favorite cover of a one-hit wonder?

Posted by Staff at 12:00 pm 4 Responses »

Jan 292020

Welcome to Cover Me Q&A, where we take your questions about cover songs and answer them to the best of our ability.

Here at Cover Me Q&A, we’ll be taking questions about cover songs and giving as many different answers as we can. This will give us a chance to hold forth on covers we might not otherwise get to talk about, to give Cover Me readers a chance to learn more about individual staffers’ tastes and writing styles, and to provide an opportunity for some back-and-forth, as we’ll be taking requests (learn how to do so at feature’s end).

Today’s question: What’s your favorite cover of a one-hit wonder?
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The Best Cover and Tribute Albums of 2019

Posted by Staff at 9:00 am 1 Response »

Dec 112019

Follow all our Best of 2019 coverage (along with previous year-end lists) here.

With their surprise success “Africa,” Weezer delivered easily the biggest cover-song news of 2018. And they similarly seemed poised to dominate this year’s cover-album news when they dropped a full set of similar songs in January (that album’s not on our list, because it is – and I say this as a fan for going on 20 years – terrible).

Thankfully, that album got forgotten about five minutes after its release. A slate of other high-profile cover albums took its place, and delivered more staying power. Angelique Kidjo, Morrissey, and Juliana Hatfield all released covers albums, and a host more stars contributed in one way or other to tribute compilations, from Norah Jones and Margo Price covering Bobbie Gentry to Courtney Barnett and Kurt Vile tackling Wilco. Some of the aforementioned made our list and some just missed it, but all are worth investigating.

That’s to say nothing of the many lesser-known artists who came out of nowhere, amazing covers records by bands and singers I’d never heard of before. Covers albums can offer a wonderful entry point for discovery, and I’ve now got a lot of new favorite bands to dig deeper into. Hopefully you’ll find a few here too.

– Ray Padgett, Editor-in-Chief

Five Good Covers: “Don’t You Want Me” (The Human League)

Posted by Sara Stoudt at 12:30 pm 4 Responses »

Jun 072019

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

The Human League created many hits throughout the ’80s and ’90s in the UK, but “Don’t You Want Me” is the one that most successfully gained popularity across the pond. Philip Oakey first recorded this song by himself, but he promoted backup vocalist, Susan Ann Sulley, to the role of co-lead, creating the duet we know and love.

To those less familiar with The Human League’s full discography, this song might be considered a one-hit wonder. However, the song has a wide influence, uniting music fans across genres and demographics. We have the ladies of The Human League to thank for inspiring Posh Spice to “wannabe” in a musical group. The song’s synthesizer pop style is so catchy, even Pitbull sampled it. Sports fans rally behind this song too; “Don’t You Want Me” enjoyed a resurgence in popularity in 2014 when fans of the Aberdeen Football Club made a push to get the song back on the UK Singles Chart.

It’s surprisingly hard to find covers that don’t start with the same intro synth beat as the original, but these five covers break from the mold.