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As much venom as I spewed in my last two lists about covers, I’m not against the concept of covering songs altogether. For all the ripping on I did towards all the absolutely putrescent renditions I know of otherwise great songs, there are some that I like.
I would characterize a good cover as one that takes the song and either captures the spirit of the original to great effect, or takes it in a different interesting direction. (That last idea is kind of a double-edged sword if you think about it, because a lot of the terrible covers I talked about in my previous two lists took the originals in too far a direction, and absolutely sucked. Partially because they slapped their grill all over it trying to make it “theirs” with little regard for the original artist.)
Naturally talking about covers both good and bad brought up the suggestion of making a list of what I consider GOOD covers.
Okay. Before continuing however, please go back and read my first two lists, which inspired this one. 20 Bad Cover Songs #1
20 Bad Cover Songs #2 Below are 20 covers of songs that may or may not be considered the greatest song covers, but they’re my personal favorites. It wasn’t any easier to narrow this list down to 20, because while there may not be a LOT of them like there are BAD covers, they all tend to be so good that picking one over another feels like I’m dropping the ball somehow. So this is by no means an end-all list. There are many more I like that I haven't made mention of, but I don't think that merits a 2nd list.
I have pretty eclectic musical tastes too, so my list might seem a little bit strange to some readers, but read on anyway. Who knows? I may just end up introducing you to something great you’ve never heard before. Also I may not have as much to say about these songs that I’ve had to say about my previous lists. It’s arguably easier to completely eviscerate song than it is to praise it…at least without becoming repetitive.
Whatever the case, here now is my list of
20 GOOD Cover Songs (I.M.O.)
20. “Barracuda” by Fergie (Originally by Heart)
Some of you may be thinking that I’m not off to the best of starts with THIS particular entry. I can understand where you’re coming from with that. After all we’re looking at not just a classic rock song, but a severely kick-ass classic rock song, but here it’s being covered by the chick from Black Eyed Peas, and SORELY for the purpose of appearing in a crappy CGI movie. (Shrek The Third)
But y’know what? Despite all that, it actually worked. I can think of only one explanation as to how it manages to succeed despite the evidence saying otherwise...and that is that for the most part, Fergie leaves the original source material alone. Unlike other hip-hop and pop artists she clearly doesn’t seem interested in “making it her’s” and modernizing it and slapping her grill all over it, (Curse you, Jessica Simpson.) she just performs the hell out of it, and it’s still awesome. (Obviously not as awesome as Heart’s original, as it lacks in the department of guitar solos, but still.)
I’m a little confused though, as to how Fergie managed to pull this off. Listening to this it’s clear she has the voice for it, but how on Earth did it manage to slip into her “to-do” list? This is after all, the one responsible for such dreck as “Big Girls Don’t Cry”, “London Bridge”, and that malignant tumor upon the music industry “My Humps.” And yet here she is performing an awesome Heart tune, and is genuinely good at it.
A puzzlement.
Watch The Video (For the music. Just ignore the rather moronic fan-vid.) 19. “I Believe I Can Fly” by Me First & The Gimme-Gimmes (Originally by R. Kelly)
Let me make one thing clear: I don’t get R. Kelly.
I don’t get why RnB music fans hold him in such high regard, and I don’t get why he’s so successful when he sounds like just about every other male singer of the period, and hasn’t bothered to refine his style since. (Then again maybe I’m not the person to be gauging that sort of thing, since I haven’t been interested in RnB since Stevie Wonder.) As such I think “I Believe I Can Fly” is a really lame and overrated song that was nothing special apart from being the flagship song for an equally lame Looney Tunes film.
Enter Fat Mike of NOFX, and we have something hilariously awesome.
I’ve said that when someone covering a song takes themselves too seriously the end results are usually piss-poor, but fortunately Fat Mike and his cover band side project, Me First & The Gimme-Gimmes don’t even know the meaning of the term.
Right from the goofy ukulele intro all the way to the end, the band takes a song that apparently some people consider uplifting, I guess? And turns it into a song perfect for skanking to, and subsequently make it a lot more uplifting by making it so upbeat and fun.
You’ll never get the full experience, however, unless you watch the completely off-the-wall music video, which takes place in a karaoke bar, contains some parodist send-ups of wedding bands, and features some ridiculously funny cameos by Jello Biafra and Andrew W.K.
18. “Shock The Monkey” by Coal Chamber & Ozzy Osborne (Originally by Peter Gabriel)
By all means, this is another song that really SHOULDN’T have worked. It is after all, a cover of a new wave song by a short-lasting metal band and for whatever reason…Ozzy Osborne?
Once again I get proven wrong, because in spite of all the confusion over this cover, it’s pretty cool. I normally shun modernizing a song, but swapping synths for distorted guitars and…a slightly different synth….works in its favor. Plus I can think of no better Peter Gabriel song that would kick ass as a metal tune than “Shock The Monkey.”
What’s more, despite my aforementioned perplexity over what Ozzy Osborne was doing there, he turns the song into a very interested duet between his distinct vocal scream, and Coal Chamber’s singer’s switch between death grunt and disturbed murmur.
It’s a good thing that of all the Peter Gabriel songs out there to be made into a metal tune, they picked one of his more beat-driven and less serious songs. If they made a metal version of say…”In Your Eyes” or “Biko” on the other hand, that would have just pissed me off.
Watch The Video 17. “I Melt With You” by Nouvelle Vague (Originally by Modern English)
Another thing I remember complaining about: Taking a normally hard rocking song, and quieting it down for the middle-of-the-road crowd. While I Melt With You by Modern English wasn’t necessarily a hard rocking song in the general sense, at first glance at this bossa nova-style cover it’s hard to reach any other conclusion.
But y’know what? This kinda works. Nouvelle Vague takes the tune and turns it into a down tempo, jazzy tune, and comes out with a rendition that’s eerily beautiful sounding. The reason I think this worked is the lyrical material of “I Melt With You” seemed sort of tailor-made for this kind of song. (It’s arguably easier to make a more down tempo cover of I Melt With You than a much more balls-out rock song like say…LAYLA.)
Reading a bit more on this, apparently jazzy covers of 80s tunes are pretty much Nouvelle Vague’s repertoire, and that only makes me want to hear MORE by them. Their Wikipedia page says that they’ve even done a lounge-style cover of “Too Drunk To Fuck” by the Dead Kennedys. Holy crap, do I ever have to hear THAT.
Watch The Video 16. “Sunday Bloody Sunday” by Richard Cheese & Lounge Against The Machine (Originally by U2)
No one better knows the humor potential to be had on the subject of ridiculous lounge singers than Richard Cheese and his backing band, Lounge Against The Machine. Cheese HAS after all, carved a delightful little niche for himself for making humorous covers of contemporary songs in the style of a greasy lounge singer, in genres ranging from swing to jazz to bossa nova.
His best, in my opinion, is his take on this U2 classic. Normally the tune is a somber war-inspired rocker driven by march-like drums, and Celtic violins…Richard Cheese on the other hand, takes the normally dour subject of The Troubles of Northern Ireland, and turns it into a spicy, upbeat mambo piece, to riotously funny effect.
But apart from the wackiness of hearing Richard Cheese spout bits of Spanglish and cries of “Aye Chihuahua!” over what should be a very depressing tune, it’s a very entertaining rendition, coupled by a great brass section, and Cheese’s admirable baritone voice.
Watch The Video 15. “Ring Of Fire” by Social Distortion (Originally by Johnny Cash)
As a band, Social Distortion has never had any sort of pretensions towards being an arty or esoteric group. They’ve pretty much always been about simple balls-out punk rock. They DO however, have the distinction of likely being the only music group in the world to have pulled off an awesome cover of Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash.
As I said in my list of BAD Cover Songs, Ring of Fire is a song that’s really damn difficult to cover, because it’s already one of the greatest, and any attempts at it can only serve to do an artist wrong. (Damn you, Olivia Newton-John.) I guess Social Distortion were aware of that at the time, because this cover doesn’t stray TOO far from the original by a whole lot. (The divide between punk rock and outlaw country isn’t very wide, if you think about it.)
Personally I will always be a little disappointed by any cover that doesn’t come with the awesome mariachi horns from the original, but Social Distortion compensate pretty well, replacing the horns with pumped up rock guitars, and manage a pretty damn solid piece that really does justice to the original.
Watch The Video 14. “Freedom Of Choice” by A Perfect Circle (Originally by Devo)
A Perfect Circle’s cover album Emotive produces mixed emotions in me. On the one hand, it contains some un-listenable covers of “What’s Going On”, “What’s So Funny ‘Bout Peace Love & Understanding”, and “Annihilation.” But on the other hand, there are some truly impressive renditions of other great songs on the album.
They had some particularly interesting takes on “People Are People” by Depeche Mode, “Let’s Have A War” by Fear, and a hauntingly beautiful a capella version of Joni Mitchell’s “The Fiddle & The Drum.” Those were all great, but foremost among them in MY mind, is their take on “Freedom Of Choice” by Devo, which sounds interestingly different in terms of tone.
Let me elaborate…on the original, it felt as though Devo was mocking the hypothetical subject of the song for deliberately remaining ignorant, and not expressing their (Ahem) freedom of choice. On the A Perfect Circle version, the sarcasm has been replaced with rage, as though the subject is about to receive an ultimate punishment for their complacency.
And y’know what? It was cool. Marvin Gaye and Elvis Costello may have been poor choices for covers, but A Perfect Circle hits it spot on with this overdriven cover, driven by blasting drums and guitars.
I never thought I’d be this excited listening to the singer of the group that WASN’T Maynard James Keenan.
Watch The Video 13. “Ziggy Stardust” by Bauhaus (Originally by David Bowie)
Initially, it’s kinda hard to picture Goth-Rock heroes Bauhaus covering Bowie to enjoyable effect. This is after all the group that gave us Bela Lugosi’s Dead, which in terms of song, is pretty far detached from most things Bowie.
Fortunately however, the song is awesome. From Peter Murphy’s glam-soaked wail, to the reverberated drums, (I know I’ve ripped on that 80s reverb drum sound before, but this time it kinda works in Bauhaus’ favor.) this song does an exceptional job at capturing the spirit of the original.
Hell, forget capturing the spirit, this cover is so good at capturing the sound of Bowie; it’s almost an imitation. (A harder-rocking imitation, though.) I can honestly say with a straight face, that if someone had never heard either version of the song, and then heard this one first, they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between the two out of context.
What’s more, it’s really saying something when the original artist says at one point that the band covering the song played it “The way he should have.”
Watch The Video 12. “Renegades Of Funk” by Rage Against The Machine (Originally by Afrika Bambataa)
For those of you who don’t know Afrika Bambataa, he was an extremely influential rap artist from the 1980s, who pioneered the collaboration between electronic music and hip-hop, (See his tune “Planet Rock” which samples a portion of “Trans-Europe Express” by Kraftwerk.) and spearheaded hip-hop’s influence in Europe, Asia, and Africa.
His influence nowadays is mostly forgotten to mainstream rappers, who are still to this day, flogging the Tupac corpse for ideas. (The severely overrated corpse.) But fortunately, Rage Against The Machine didn’t forget about him when they released this awesome cover.
Rap-rock and I have a very turbulent relationship, mostly because it’s spawn annoy the hell out of me and make me wish it would go die in a fire someplace, but I have never disliked Rage Against The Machine, or for that matter their pet projects like One Day as a Lion, and The Night Watchman, (Audioslave never existed to me.) because they’re probably one of the only groups out there who can combine rock and rap music and do it properly.
As such this was an awesome song for them to cover, not just so we could hear more of Zack De La Rocha’s awesome lyrical prowess, (Which DOESN’T ONCE make mention of bitches and ho’s.) but because of the amazing noises created by guitarist Tom Morello, who may not be the greatest guitarist of all time, but is definitely one of the most innovative.
Watch The Video 11. “Ball Of Confusion” by Anthrax (Originally by The Temptations)
My musical tastes are always in a state of constant flux, but as far as I can remember, ever since I started developing my own musical tastes, I’ve always liked metal pioneers Anthrax, because they not only paved the way for thrash and speed metal, but in their later years they proved to be an extremely versatile metal band. Case in point, this cover, which is NOT speed or thrash metal.
Unfortunately this rendition is ultimately flawed by the fact that it doesn’t have any of those fantastic vocal harmonizations that The Temptations were so famous for, but you can’t really expect a metal band to pull something like that off. To cope with that however, they instead turn it into a very interesting duet between the current singer at the time, John Bush also of Armored Saint, and their PREVIOUS singer, Joey Belladonna.
Oh yeah, and of course the music kicks ass. It’s amazing to see how well they managed to adapt the original Motown music to metal, and to see how everything perfectly falls into place, without any section overpowering another.
A friend of mine once said, comparing the two versions: The Temptations version has the best lyrics, but the Anthrax version has the best music. If the two were to combine together somehow, (Like say…Anthrax backing the Temptations in concert.) it would be a transcendental level of awesome, akin to spreading Branston Pickle on No More Heroes, if you’ll forgive the Zero Punctuation reference.
10. “Hallelujah” by Jeff Buckley (Originally by Leonard Cohen)
In writing this list, this is where I reached my first fork in the road. I had to choose between two distinctly different, but both well-done covers of the same song, Hallelujah by Leonard Cohen.
Should I go with the Jeff Buckley version, which featured beautiful, quavering vocals backed only by a single electric guitar, thus making the entire piece sound distinctly mysterious? Or should I go with the more straightforward piano-driven cover by Rufus Wainwright, which featured equally beautiful but more confident vocals?
It was a tough decision, because both versions are great takes on the song, and both are widely acclaimed by fellow musicians.
In the end however, my vote went to the most well known of the two, Jeff Buckley’s version. There’s something almost supernatural about his version, especially listening to it now, more than 10 years after his death by accidental drowning. And Jeff Buckley’s unsure vocal whispers best reflect the song’s subject matter of sexual tension, and religion.
Watch The Video 9. “Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You” by Lauryn Hill (Originally by Frankie Valli)
Man, whatever happened to Lauryn Hill? She was one of the last really great female soul singers I ever heard before they all started getting caught up in this diva bullshit. She released one studio album in 1998, and then completely disappeared off the map, stating she was fed up with stardom.
Oh well, maybe it’s for the better, because if she stuck around going solo for too long she would have ended up making shitty songs with the likes of Timbaland, and be a product placement whore routinely appearing on Saturday Night Live, just like….eh…EVERY RnB SINGER OUT THERE RIGHT NOW.
Okay, I’m done with that.
Getting back on topic, one great contribution she made to the musical community before disappearing was this spot-on Frankie Valli cover. It’s sung with such sincerity and emotion, without having to resort to needless vocal showboating, it just makes for an exceptional tune.
But what I really like about it is during the bridges that appear before the chorus. Perhaps you know what I mean. I’m talking about the stunning vocal harmonies that Hill engages in with HERSELF. Completely awesome.
Watch The Video 8. “Fade To Black” by Apoptygma Berzerk (Originally by Metallica)
Here is where I’m almost completely certain we’ll be reaching a difference of opinion, dear readers.
I try not to make it a secret that I’m a fan of electronic music, (ELECTRONIC MUSIC. Not TECHNO. Techno is a subgenre. Not the ENTIRE genre.) but I’m hesitant about electronic tunes that remake older classic songs. I attribute that to DJ Sammy’s god-awful, and wholly unnecessary remakes of “Boys Of Summer” and “Everybody Hurts”. Therefore when I saw this for download on a file-sharing server one day while searching for “Metallica” I was unsure what to think about it, but downloaded it anyway because my curiosity was piqued.
And holy shit was my mind blown away.
Far from being just Metallica with a 4/4 beat attached to it, Apoptygma Berzerk’s take on Fade To Black keeps the dour tone of the original, and yet manages to fill it with unbridled energy. Couple this with vocals emulating Hetfield’s original rendition, and dark cathedral bells, and we have a completely awesome trance tune that doesn’t get piled under mounds of electro-cheese like…well…anything by DJ Sammy.
Watch The Video 7. “Wish You Were Here” by Sparklehorse & Thom Yorke (Originally by Pink Floyd)
Someone once told me that anyone who tries to cover Pink Floyd must be stupid.
I dunno who it was, but they’re wrong, after all this stunning cover exists. The rendition is by obscure British group Sparklehorse, and features Thom Yorke of Radiohead on vocals, and it appeared on an equally obscure Radiohead album, Lost Treasures: 1993-1997. (Although only Yorke appears on the song, not the whole of Radiohead.)
All in all the cover is extremely loyal to the original, but one thing makes it for me, and that’s the vocals by Yorke. Now I liked the original Wish You Were Here, but I felt like David Gilmour’s quiet shouting vocals weren’t really fitting of the subject matter. (Alienation.) In this version however, Yorke’s vocals come out as a quiet, and gentle, but elegant whimper, and I feel it better captures the turmoil meaning to be conveyed.
Plus the band manages to make the song sound even MORE detached from reality than the original, with acoustic bass plucks appearing out of nowhere, some guitar notes playing backwards, and rather creepy static-heavy French radio signals fading in and out of the song. Sure, this song was a classic for Pink Floyd, but I heard this version before I heard the Floyd version, and I STILL like it more.
6. “Caroline, No” by They Might Be Giants (Originally by The Beach Boys)
Generally whenever people think of both They Might Be Giants and cover songs in the same context, they think of their take on Istanbul (Not Constantinople) originally by the Four Lads. And why not? It’s a catchy, and delightfully quirky take on what’s normally a swing tune, that just exhibits the best in They Might Be Giants.
But I’m not gonna talk about that one. I don’t need to. They Might Be Giants did such an awesome job with that song that they’ve made it their own. Everyone knows it’s a great cover, so instead I’m gonna focus my attention to another great cover of theirs (They have a LOT of them.) that less people have heard.
On their Indestructible Object EP, which was released just before their 2003 album The Spine, along with a few original songs, there was also a cover of the final track from the Beach Boys magnum opus, Pet Sounds. While They Might Be Giants are normally known for being an incredible eccentric and quirky group, they did the cover straight, doing a complete 180 in terms of their usual musical style.
Admittedly a Beach Boys song without those amazing harmonies they’re so famous for feels incomplete, but listening to this cover I don’t even care, because it’s just such a beautiful rendition. John Flansburgh sings with genuine heart and emotion, which shows that the two Johns really felt a connection to the original source material, in making this.
What I can’t understand though, is at least according to one or two fan-forums I’ve looked over, this cover isn’t very popular among TMBG fans. I guess it’s because it’s not wild and quirky like their other tunes, but the way I see it, it shows just how great they are as artists, that they can switch between geekiness and crooning with such smoothness.
Watch The Video 5. “Gasoline Alley” by Long John Baldry (Originally by Rod Stewart)
It’s hard to picture it, but at one point Rod Stewart was a blues-rock musician, and not extremely creepy and drug-crazed. During that period of time he produced an album called Gasoline Alley, which has been lauded by critics as one of his best ever, and a highly influential album from the 70s.
Stewart owes a debt of gratitude for that success, because he got much of his blues chops from influential, but unfairly forgotten blues musician Long John Baldry, who was a sort of mentor to both Rod Stewart and fellow rocker Elton John. (Interesting fact: Long John Baldry was the “Someone” in Elton John’s song “Someone Saved My Life Tonight” after he managed to talk Elton John out of committing suicide.)
He ultimately had more fame in the field of voice acting, (The original, and best goddamn voice of Doctor Robotnik.) and reveled in obscurity musically up until his untimely death in 2005.
Segueing Rod Stewart’s Gasoline Alley to Long John Baldry brings me to 1973, when Baldry covered the title track for his album Good To Be Alive. (Instantly one of my all-time favorites upon discovering it.) To put it short, he runs rings around Stewart’s original. His is energetic, catchy, and EXTREMELY folksy, incorporating mandolins, banjos, and fiddles into the tune.
Unfortunately I couldn’t find a video of the cover, but that’s okay, because the entire album Good To Be Alive is available on Baldry’s website for download, so I have the mp3 link to this amazing song here.
Listen To It Here 4. “I Fought The Law” by The Clash (Originally by The Crickets)
Now this is one of those songs where upon listening to it, you never even knew it was a cover in the first place, but you don’t really care to listen to the original because the covered version is just so perfect. I still haven’t bothered to listen to the Crickets version because I’m plenty content with the Clash version.
After all, the Clash is the perfect group to cover a song like I Fought The Law, taking their politically charged punk rock stylings and slapping it all over the original. That and the addition of an infectious harmonized chorus add up to a timeless take on the tune.
The original has been covered a lot. It’s been a hit country-rock song for the Bobby Fuller Four, and an absolutely craptastic version was released by Green Day, (Who are woefully misinformed about just how talented they are.) but none of them hold up to the raw power exerted by the Clash’s version.
I would also recommend the Dead Kennedy’s version, which re-wrote the tune into a satire on the concept of the Twinkie defense used by Dan White to avoid conviction for murdering San Francisco politician Harvey Milk in the Seventies.
Watch The Video 3. “All Along The Watchtower” by Jimi Hendrix (Originally by Bob Dylan)
There’s an unwritten law somewhere that everything that Jimi Hendrix is attached to becomes completely awesome. Seriously, I can’t think of anything BAD Hendrix has done during his lifetime. He was such a great artist that he was able to take a Bob Dylan song and make it his. (Bob Dylan is yet another awesome artist, though not nearly as flawless, as his newer work can attest.)
What’s really amazing about this cover is the sheer difference between the two versions. Dylan’s is a quiet acoustic ballad with minimal backing, while Hendrix turns it into a fiery display of his guitar wizardry, with truly exciting drum work, and as with the rest of his discography Hendrix pours his soul out in the vocals.
I’ve heard this version so much that I can’t even picture Dylan ever having done this song, because it rocks so damn hard, and Hendrix makes it his so well. I’ve even read somewhere that ever since Hendrix died, Dylan has been performing the song the way Hendrix covered it.
Pretty powerful stuff.
Watch The Video 2. “Hurt” by Johnny Cash (Originally by Nine Inch Nails)
Now this is a fine example of stealing someone else’s song. Let me clarify: I’m not talking about like how Puff Daddy stole songs and co-opted them for his own petty whims. I’m talking about taking a song from someone else’s library, and doing such a completely amazing cover of it, that it becomes difficult to hear it coming from anyone else, even the originator.
One of the last songs recorded towards the end of his life, Cash took Trent Reznor’s industrial tune about alienation from everybody, and turned it into an even more somber, quiet acoustic ballad, redirecting the subject matter towards his ailing condition. The end result was a haunting piece about mortality, and reflection on life, and it was magnificent.
Reznor himself heaped praise upon the cover, stating: “It really made me think about how powerful music is as a medium and art form. I wrote some words and music in my bedroom as a way of staying sane, about a bleak and desperate place I was in, totally isolated and alone. Somehow that winds up reinterpreted by a music legend from a radically different era/genre and still retains sincerity and meaning — different, but every bit as pure. ”
Watch The Video A stunning and majestic piece, but not my absolute favorite. No. That would be…
1. “I Can’t Get No (Satisfaction)” by Devo (Originally by The Rolling Stones)
This is the heart of rock music, right here. Taking a song that even in it’s heyday is considered a classic, and completely deconstructs it and twists it completely out of shape, only to re-build it into something nearly unrecognizable from the original.
It was wild, it was twisted, it was completely messed up compared to the straightforward rock and roll of the original classic...And it was awesome beyond comparison.
In their career Devo have always been a band focused upon completely turning the norms of music upside down, (Which is how I’m able to forgive them for any times they’ve sold their music to commercials, and for goddamn Disney making that shit-tastically kiddy Dev2.0 group.) and no song of theirs encompasses this willingness to defy these boundaries than this ridiculously catchy and completely off-the-wall rendition (Though some Rolling Stones die-hards would say “desecration.”) of what’s considered one of Rock music’s classics.
Watch The Video And that about does it for my “Trilogy of Cover-Lists.” Hope you enjoyed all three. Since they’ve received such positive feedback, I think I’ve found my own little niche amongst all the video game, TV, and movie lists posted here at TGWTG.com, so I’ll probably be doing some more. Not necessarily about covers, though.
If you have an idea for list you wanna see, leave me a comment.
For now though, I return to complete obscurity and receiving no page views ever again. XP
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also, bowling for soup did a good cover of i melt with you.