Calling Birdy incredibly talented for a 15-year old is accurate, but insufficient. This small singer is incredibly talented for any age. She’s warmed hearts all over Britain in the past year with her covers of the xx and Bon Iver and her debut album just dropped over there. It includes the aforementioned cuts, as well as covers of Phoenix, the National, Fleet Foxes, the Postal Service, and more. We’ve got a few sample tracks to stream below. Continue reading »
The first CD released by The Postal Service was the 2003 single “Such Great Heights.” The song was written by Ben Gibbard and Jimmy Tamborello and featured Iron & Wine doing a cover version on the B-side. The Iron & Wine take was featured on the soundtrack for Garden State and went on to become the wider-known version. Ever since, the song has made the cover rounds. Ben Folds, Rilo Kiley, Streelight Manifesto have all had a go and recently we featured Amanda Palmer and Kim Boekbinder doing a wonderful ukulele version. Continue reading »
Amanda Palmer is no stranger to covers, nor is The Postal Service’s “Such Great Heights.” Palmer’s new duet cover of the song, however, has provided the Cover Me introduction to the delightful Kim Boekbinder (of the duo Vermillion Lies) and we’re all the better for it. Continue reading »
They Say It’s Your Birthday celebrates an artist’s big day with cover tributes to his or her songs. Let others do the work for a while. Happy birthday!
Prolific indie musician Ben Gibbard celebrates his 35th birthday on August 11. He’ll be spending the big day in Georgia, touring in support of Death Cab for Cutie’s latest release Codes and Keys; here at Cover Me we’re saluting him with five covers of his work by other artists. In light of his extensive catalogue with both Death Cab and electronic side project The Postal Service, there were a lot of options, but we’ve narrowed it down to a few of the best. Continue reading »
Cover News is a weekly feature where I sum up the week’s cover-related news, whether it’s new to the world or just new to me. Anything that doesn’t fit in my regular thematic posts I think my readers would enjoy, be it a youtube video, a blog shout-out, or a cool-looking new release. I also post all the submissions I have gotten from record labels and artists.
Time to debut another new feature here at Cover Me! I’ve loved sharing the music with you all over the past year and a half, but I always find stuff that doesn’t fit in my somewhat constricting thematic format. So allow me to present a new supplementary series: Cover News. Anything cover-related I think you should hear now, without waiting for it to fit into one of my themes.
One of the most exciting parts will be sharing the many submissions I get from artists and labels. I always feel guilty when I am sent great tracks or CDs and take forever posting them because they don’t fit into a theme. So here you can grab the tunes as soon as they reach my mailbox. Side note: Any artists/labels that sent me tunes I never posted, remind me and they will go up here next week. The days of your (completely justified) impatience are over!
This Week’s News
The first bit of news is a little self-promotion, a reminder that you only have four more days to decide which song derpferdheisshorstwienerschnitzelschwarzeneggerkablowie (sp?) covers for this week’s Cover Commissions. Read about it here, then vote on the right.
I’d like to give a shout-out to the newest member to the cover crew, Grand Passion. There’s plenty of tunes out there, so the more the merrier!
Ariel Aparicio does a great cover of the Psychedelic Furs’ “Pretty in Pink,” and now you can hear it while supporting a good cause! Buy it from iTunes here and Ariel will donate all his profits to the Greater New York City Affiliate of Susan G. Komen For The Cure, founded for a friend battling breast cancer.
Highly Rec’d has come up with a nice little playlist called Don’t Hog the Covers ’09 that you can check out here. From Elvis to the Thermals, they’ve got you covered.
Our old friend James Eric directed me to Redbear’s live set of Velvet Underground covers, available for free at the music paradise CLLCT (hint: search “cover). Thanks James!
Fiona Apple has been hiding out recently, but she’s resurfaced with a track for a Cy Coleman tribute EP. Listen to “Why Try to Change Me Now?” here.
Old-school folkie Marianne Faithfull has released a covers disc that tries to get some of that Johnny Cash mojo, taking on everyone from Espers to Merle Haggard. The unquestioned high point though is her take on The Decemberists’ “The Crane Wife 3” with Nick Cave, and you can watch her perform it on Letterman here.
In a blogosphere filled with shoddy posts and quick tunes, you can always count on Aquarium Drunkard to raise the bar for thoughtful content along with their tunes. Read about (then listen to) Whiskeytown’s “Nervous Breakdown” cover here, then check out their thoughts on Spoon doing Destroyer thisaway.
Berkeley Place isn’t technically a cover blog, but dude posts so many covers it might as well be. All Kurt fans will love his set of Nirvana covers, rarities, etc. Did I set set? I meant sets. It’s a four part post.
The Smithsonian is offering a free download of Cephas & Winnan’s version of the folk classic “John Henry,” which I found over at Muruch.
This Week’s Submissions
The Marches – Cold Shoulder (Adele) [Website]
My Lady’s House – I Kissed a Girl (Katy Perry) [Website]
Daniel Eaton – Just Like Honey (Jesus and Mary Chain) [Website]
Neil Nathan – Do Ya (Electric Light Orchestra) [Website]
Catman Cohen – Fade Into You (Mazzy Star) [Website]
Sharif – The District Sleeps Alone Tonight (The Postal Service) [Website]
Haverford Humtones – Get Behind the Mule (Tom Waits) [Website]