Saturday 29 March 2014

UNDER THE COVERS (SUPPLEMENTAL)


Last week I promised to add an extra piece to my three-part look at cover songs.

Here it is.

Rather rashly, I'd decided to produce a Top 20 listing of my favourite cover songs, comparing them to the *originals* courtesy of judicious use of You Tube clips. It's been an impossible task to do in any truly meaningful way: some songs just aren't on You Tube, some I don't have in my mighty Musical Box database - and (critically), my selections are so fluid as to be more changeable than David Bowie's dress sense. But, I have collected together a Top 20 which I think is representative of what I think makes a good cover song. I've resisted the temptation to include a token *bad* cover song and have also not repeated numbers I've used as examples in the series thus far. That aside, I hope that the choices will provoke comment and debate - and, with any luck, delight and admiration for uncovering (do you see what I did there?) numbers which will give a little bit of credibility to this much misunderstood genre.

 I should add - for clarity's sake - that I'm not suggesting the covers are better than the originals, rather that they bring something different to them, a little twist if you like.

You can check out the the three previous episodes right here:

So, from the tens of thousands and more borrowed numbers around, here are some which should be so much more than a guilty pleasure. 

Prepare to be entertained.

BORROWED SONGS - A TOP 20 


This is a personal selection and, of course, there are bound to be many other borrowed songs that I could have included, but on the day - today! - this is what I felt represented a good starting point. Each song is represented with both the original and the cover together with a quick line or two noting why I chose it. They're not in any particular order: that was just a step too far, trying to rank them. If pushed for my all-time top-favourite borrowed song, I could be persuaded to choose one - and may very well do so at the end of the listing.

 THE FIRST

Mott - Mott The Hoople's
final album with Mick Ralphs
Maria McKee - 1993 Single B Side


The Mott The Hoople album is, possibly the best of their career - a high to go out on prior to the departure of lead guitarist Mick Ralphs for new band Bad Company. Maria McKee is a much overlooked singer-songwriter and her version with some really heart-felt vocals appears as the "B-Side" to her 1993 single, I Can't Make It Alone.
THE SECOND

Judee Sill's second album
Heart Food (1972)
Shawn Colvin - Her version on
Cover Girl (1994)

















Judee Sill was a sad loss to the world of music: she was a singer-songwriter who only produced two album sin her short life, but she certainly had a real ability for creating fine songs with smart lyrics. Shawn Colvin's version - from her 1994 covers release Cover Girl - brings a real sensitivity and feel for the music and lyrics: not better, but definitely worthy.



THE THIRD 

Eddie Cochrane
A hit single in 1958

T Rex - B-Side to the hit single
Ride a White Swan (1970)






Both Eddie Cochran and T.Rex's Marc Bolan died young in car crashes here in the UK. Cochran created some of the most forceful rock and roll numbers around -and Bolan, brought up on such music, took the opportunity to include the band's version of Summertime Blues on the B-Side of their breakthrough hit single Ride A White Swan in 1970. Complete with Mickey Finn on bongos, Bolan transformed the song - but still remained faithful to its heart and soul.
THE FOURTH 

Harry Nilsson - His second album
Aerial Bullet (1968)
Aimee Mann - Wrote or performed
most  of the songs for the 1999
film soundtrack to Magnolia 
















 Harry Nilsson had quite a difficult life, but still managed to create a wealth of great songs. An early success was One which can be found on his second studio release, 1968's Aerial Bullet. Some thirty years later, singer-songwriter - and sometime member of Til Tuesday - Aimee Mann chose it as one of the few songs that she didn't write for the soundtrack to the 1999 film, Magnolia. Her performance puts a bit of rock guitar into it, and in many ways, I prefer it to the original.
THE FIFTH

The Kinks Are The
Village Green Preservation Society
(1968)
Kate Rusby's 2007 album
Awkward Annie featured her
version of Village Green 















The Kinks' Ray Davies has been one of the best songwriters of the past 50 years - and he's never better than when looking inwardly at his native land and everyday life. The band's 1968 album The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society was a whole suite of such music, a refreshing change in the late 60s from everything "summer of love". Kate Rusby, a superb folk singer-songwriter, reprised the title track for her 2007 album Awkward Annie - and with her Yorkshire accent bringing something new to the song, it is deserving of its place in this Top 20.  


THE SIXTH

Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
Ohio - 1970
Dala - Canadian folk duo 















Neil Young remains one of the most accomplished singer-songwriters that Canada has produced. Here is a classic early number he penned for Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young, a reaction to the Kent State shootings  in 1970. It was initially the B-Side to the band's single Find The Cost Of Freedom and was an angry, rock-based number. It's been covered many times by many artists, but a completely different treatment was applied by fellow-Canadian duo, Dala. They stripped it right back and it became almost a folk-ballad. A live example from 2009 captures the delicate power they bring to it. 
THE SEVENTH


Eurythmics - The single sleeve for
Love Is a Stranger (1982)
Martha Wainwright
Love Is a Stranger (2008)













The Eurythmics' second album - 1982's Sweet Dreams - was packed full of fine songs, several of which were big hits - including Love Is a Stranger. Some years later in 2008, Martha Wainwright - daughter of Kate McGarrigle and Loudon Wainwright - recorded an excellent album called I Know You're Married, But I've Got Feelings Too. Here she takes Love Is A Stranger, adds acoustic guitar, strips away the synth - and creates a fascinating new variant of the song.
THE EIGHTH


Fred Neil - Self-titled second album
(1966) 
Beth Orton - Best Bit covers EP
(1997)

Fred Neil was one of those unsung heroes of the folk-music scene: he didn't record many albums in his long career - and didn't like touring, so his name doesn't normally register with the general public. His songs do, though - many have been covered and especially Dolphins which appeared on his 1966 self-titled album. In 1997, Beth Orton - renowned for adding dub sounds to her folk music and thus creating trip-hop - teamed up with another folkie who had slipped under the radar, Terry Callier. The Covers EP Best Bit was the result, an EP which contained their superb version of Fred Neill's original. 
THE NINTH


Marvin Gaye
Ain't That Peculiar - a 1965 hit 
Fanny
There version on Fanny Hill (1972)














An early hit for soul legend Marvin Gaye was 1965's Ain't That Peculiar: it sold well over a million copies. Seven years later in 1972, one of the first all-girl rock groups was the excellent Fanny - and they did a rather fine rock version on their third album, perhaps their best, Fanny Hill. Sadly, they were another of those bands who should have been much better known than they were.
THE TENTH


Donovan at the height of his powers
Sunshine Superman (1966)
Julie Driscoll, Brian Augur &
The Trinity - Open (1967)













Donovan Leitch was very far from being a Dylan copyist as some had labelled him in the early 60s. He embraced psychedelia in the mid-period of that decade and created a suite of top quality songs - including Season of The Witch which appeared on his 1966 album, Sunshine Superman. A year later, Julie Driscoll, teamed up with Brian Augur and The Trinity, recorded a fine jazz-rock version for their 1967 album Open: it's got more of a live session feel to it and works very well indeed.
THE ELEVENTH

Bonnie Dobson - Her fine
single from 1964
The Grateful Dead
Self-titled debut (1967)















Bonnie Dobson is a Canadian folk-singer who started out in 1961 and enjoyed some success until the middle of that turbulent decade. Her most well-known song is Morning Dew, a post-apocolyptic song that was influenced by the film On The Beach. Her performance still stands up well today - and the song has been covered by many artists across the years. In 1967, The Grateful Dead, a band at the centre of the San Franciscan counter-culture did a version on their self-titled debut album. It works very well indeed, the psychedelic feel to their music and Jerry Garcia's plaintive vocals making it a band classic.
THE TWELFTH  

The Small Faces
Song Of A Baker appeared
on their 1968 magnum opus
Ogden's Nut Gone Flake
Screaming Trees














Shortly before The Small Faces splintered in 1968, their "magnum opus" Ogden's Nut Gone Flake was released in its distinctive round, metal packaging. Part-concept album and part psychedelic rock, it's a fine collection of songs - including the organ-drenched Song Of A Baker. In 1992, US rock band Screaming Trees paid homage to The Small Faces with an excellent version of the song - it appeared as the B-Side to their Nearly Lost You single.
THE THIRTEENTH



Free - Hit single
Wishing Well (1972)
Maggie Bell in full flight
Her version appeared on
Suicide Sal in 1975




Free were a fine *classic* blues rock band, but a band that had a knack for adding a commercial edge to their songs and thus ensuring a supply of regular hit singles too. 1972 saw Wishing Well, a number with lead singer Paul Rodgers in fine form and a number that would appear on the band's final album Heartbreaker the following year. In 1975, Maggie Bell - one of the best blues rock singers this island has produced - had left her band Stone The Crows to go solo. In that year, her second album Suicide Sal was released - and on it, a superb version of Wishing Well. There's a bit more of a funky beat to it and her vocals have got a much-more shredded and lived-in feel to them.
THE FOURTEENTH

Tim Hardin
The Smoke Fairies
Fine folk-roots duo













Tim Hardin was another of that crop of early 60s folk musicians who died far too young; but, in the short time he had with us, he wrote a number of fine songs which are still remembered and covered today. If I Were A Carpenter was one of them. It was released on his second album Tim Hardin 2 in 1967 and our cover version is by a Sussex-based duo, The Smoke Fairies, a band that can do smooth and mellow folk music as well as folk-rock at the louder end of the scale. Their version was a contribution to Reason To Believe, a tribute album to Tim Hardin released in 2012.
THE FIFTEENTH

Joni Mitchell - Blue (1971)
Nazareth - Loud 'N Proud (1973)














Quite possibly one of the best cover versions of a song that I can think of: it takes the original, changes the whole vibe and feel of it - and yet, clearly it's still the same song. This Flight Tonight was written by Joni Mitchell and it appears on her 1971 landmark release Blue. On here, it's almost a folk number- albeit with Mitchell's expert vocals taking it well beyond such a thing. In 1973, Glaswegian rockers Nazareth covered it for their album Loud 'N Proud. They grabbed it right from the off with guitar riffs and a driving beat; Dan McCafferty's gruff vocals work well - and the effects on the radio sequences are really effective. A classic of its kind.


THE SIXTEENTH


The Youngbloods
Self-titled debut (1967)
The Kingston Trio
Their version released in 1964













This song was originally written in 1962 by Chet Powers - who later reverted to his given name Dino Valenti when he joined psychedelic rockers Quicksilver Messenger Service. In the early 60s, he was a struggling singer-songwriter, but Get Together was picked up by The Kingston Trio as Let's Get Together and the song assumed a life of its own. In 1967,The Youngbloods recorded a rock version for their self-titled debut and, following TV exposure, the song hit the "Summer Of Love" zeigeist. The Kingston Trio version here is a live recording.
THE SEVENTEENTH

The Everly Brothers
Gone Gone Gone (1964)
Alison Krauss & Robert Plant
Live in 2007












The Everly Brothers released an album called Gone Gone Gone in 1964 and the title track - our selection here - had much more of a rock feel to it than the rock and roll numbers they'd become known for. Maybe this was because of the growing impact of the British rock and pop invasion, who can say: but it is a spendid number. When one-time Led Zeppelin vocalist Robert Plant teamed up with bluegrass virtuoso fiddle player and singer Alison Krauss, Gone Gone Gone was the first single from their 2007 album Raising Sand. It was an extended version - true to the original, but also adding something new with the power, strength and feeling that they both brought to it.
THE EIGHTEENTH

The Byrds
Ballad Of Easy Rider (1969)
Fairport Convention
Heyday (BBC Radio Sessions)
(1968/1969)
















 One of the big alternative films of 1969 was Easy Rider, a counter-culture classic with its title song penned by Roger McGuinn of The Byrds. The Byrds recorded it for their album in November of that year, it also taking the name The Ballad Of Easy Rider. It's a fine song and so suited to the naescent country rock that The Byrds were about to embrace. A rare - but haunting - cover was recorded by British folk-rockers Fairport Convention in the same year, although despite being aired in live sessions for BBC Radio 1, the recorded version wasn't officially released until 2003 as a bonus track on the reissue of Unhalfbricking. Sandy Denny's vocals are sublime - and the band slow the song down slightly and make it (I think) even more poignant.
THE NINETEENTH

The Arctic Monkeys
From Suck It And See (2011)
Caitlin Rose
Her version for Record Store Day 2012 
















Here's a fine song from The Arctic Monkeys, a number penned by Alex Turner and appearing on their 2011 album Suck It And See. It's called Piledriver Waltz, but from such an odd title comes a lyrically wonderful song that was grabbed by US singer-songwriter Caitlin Rose for a Record Store Day release in 2012. Her version is simply beautiful: a rock song becomes a kind of country/Americana cross-over and her crystal clear vocals are a delight. 


THE TWENTIETH
Billy Bragg
Life's A Riot With
With Spy Versus Spy
(1983) 
Kirsty MacColl
Hit single with her version of
A New England in 1984


  















Two excellent singer-songwriters with very different approaches to a fine song. Billy Bragg wrote New England in 1983, it appearing on his album Life's A Riot With Spy Versus Spy. The song - just Bragg singing and playing an amped-up guitar - wasn't released as a single, but it remains a classic of its type. A year later, the much-missed Kirsty MacColl recorded a poppier and brighter version of it, released it as a single and enjoyed chart success. The approach she took still honours the song's lyrical content which is probably how a good cover song should  be.  

AND IN THE END....


And there we have it.

My run through of a current Top 20 chart of borrowed songs, although I'll be the first to admit that were I to repeat the exercise tomorrow, it may well be a little different. I'm sure there are plenty of omissions that you, dear readers, believe ought to have been included, so why not leave me a comment here and tell me? You never know - this supplement might yet have a supplement all of its own. 

Join me again next week when I start a new series that explores the theme music used for landmark TV programmes and movies. It's a massive subject, so we'll just dip into a few of the major strands and see where that takes us.

Thanks for reading - and listening!

Alan Dorey
31st March 2014
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Saturday 22 March 2014

UNDER THE COVERS (Part 3 Of 3)


And here we are with the third and final part of my look at the strange world of cover songs. Last week, I described a range of categories that embraced the many different types of borrowed tunes. I then looked at some of these in much more depth. This time, the task is completed. As before, plenty of examples are included - courtesy of links to You Tube - and next week, as a special supplement, I'll list my current Top 20 borrowed songs. Of course, this attempt will be doomed to failure as choices always change and you, dear readers, may very well disagree with my selections. But, it's a starting point for discussion - and that isn't always a bad thing.

Before I  head off into the uncharted waters of this episode, why not check out the first two parts right here:

So - chocs away, let's go!

ARTIST COVERS - INDIVIDUAL TRACKS


In many ways, this category could include just about anything. 
The Beatles - Magical Mystery Tour
It isn't very exciting to simply trawl through a list of covers and point out the little quirks and differences compared to the original, so we'll take a different approach. Here, we'll ignore "standards", that is songs from quite some way back which have moved beyond just being a cover. They are de rigeur for certain kinds of artist and consequently, have been replicated numerous times in recent years. Defining what's a "standard" is awkward, but something like The Beatles' Yesterday probably is whilst Magical Mystery Tour, recorded just a year later, isn't. The focus, such as it is, will be on distinctive covers, new versions which - for some reason - are memorable or have some innate quality of their own. Even this apparent limitation leaves us with a multitude of fine music, so I'll home in on a typical song for each of the "sub-categories" of cover number.

 Better Than The Original
The Zutons - Second album
including original version of
Valerie
Some say that the only reason for doing a cover song is to "make it better than the original". That's certainly a motivation. Old songs often get updates to improve upon recording and presentation, to turn it into a new song - but one with enough of the original's DNA to make it recognisable. In part 1, we highlighted one of the best examples - Jimi Hendrix's version of Bob Dylan's All Along The Watchtower - and here, another cover that betters its original. One of the most interesting bands to emerge from Liverpool in the early part of the century was The Zutons. Ostensibly an indie band, they also had a happy knack for creating music that had a nod back to the late 60s with its psychedelic vibes. Their second album Tired Of Hanging Around came out in 2007 and on it,  a fine song called Valerie. Also released as a single and getting into the lower reaches of the UK Top 20, it was a fine jangly-guitar number that harked back to the r&b styles of their favourite decade. It's a good performance, complete with backing singers and a heartfelt vocal from Dave McCabe.
Amy Winehouse, produced by
 Mark Ronson - cover of
Valerie
A year later, producer Mark Ronson was putting together an album of contemporary cover songs (Version), one of which was an excellent take on Valerie by the much missed Amy Winehouse. She'd had great success with her debut album Back To Black and with this song, released as a single and hitting number 2 on the UK charts with sales of over 330,000, her career momentum was maintained. Winehouse took the vocals by the scruff of the neck and really put an authentic r&b vibe on them. It sounded like the song had been frozen in amber since the 1960s such was the emotional content of the vocal punch that she brought to it. 

Both are fine versions, but Amy Winehouse brings a little more heart and soul to hers.


Movie Updating

 In recent years, no self-respecting movie is released that doesn't come with a song-packed Official Sound Track album. No matter that some numbers may only have  appeared for a fleeting moment, the album is all about sales and promotion - and bringing the money in. Licensing existing songs can be an expensive business, but more and more movie production companies do it. There are two issues worth noting - firstly, a song's performance is "of its time" and thus whilst lyrically it may fit the movie, the image it portrays may not be contemporary enough. Secondly, it is that matter of cost: movie budgets have a tendency to spiral out of control and anything that can be done to contain the cost of music will be foremost in the director's mind (and if it isn't, the producers will no doubt remind him or her). Using - or creating - cover songs minimises the impacts of these risks. A modern version can better match the feel of the movie - and by using a cover artist, expenses can be better capped.
David Bowie - Diamond Dogs (1974)
Beck - His version of Diamond Dogs
was on the Moulin Rouge
sound track. 













Take the Baz Luhrmann smash hit Moulin Rouge which starred Ewan McGregor aned Nicole Kidman, released in 2001. It was a musical - but the majority of songs were rock and pop numbers from the past 40 years or more, some sung by the cast - others by current artists. It worked well for this movie and it went on to win numerous awards including several for the soundtrack songs. One of the most interesting covers that illustrates the point about *updating* was by Beck, that fine US indie and rock artist. His task was to take David Bowie's semi-science fiction epic Diamond Dogs and make it fit this period pastiche "jukebox drama", as one critic described it. And what a fine job of it he made.

Promoting New Artists 

 An effective way to gain recognition as a new artist is to drop a few cover songs into your live set. This provides some instant audience-recognition - and hopefully encourages them to listen to the artist's own material as well. When it comes to recording songs, a decent cover song can - again - provide that initial sense of familiarity to the listeners. But - and it's a big but - there is a downside in that without understanding the pitfalls, it is very easy for artists to get trapped into a cycle of doing covers, rather than being creative with their own songs. Indeed, in some ways, this is a danger that is becoming more and more prevalent with the continued popularity of TV talent shows such as The X-Factor and The Voice. What ever we may think of such programmes, they usually do discover singers who are technically proficient. They won't be singing their own songs though, so despite any inate talent, any album that gets produced as a result of their exposure will tend to "play it safe". It is a rare thing that they get to a second album.
Fleetwood Mac
Go Your Own Way (1977)
Lissie - also going her way
(2011)














However, some musicians do manage to carve out a successful career by a judicious selection of covers that complement their own material. One such artist is Lissie, a US singer-songwriter who specialises in folk-rock, pop-rock and country-rock. She's from Illinois and was recognised by respected music magazine Paste as the "Best new solo artist of 2010). Her debut album Catching A Tiger was filled with original material, but it was only in 2011 that she started to gain real recognition with a Fleetwood Mac cover that proved to be very popular. Since then, she's released a second album of originals, but has also gained a reputation as a strong covers artist with her versions of material by such as Nick Cave, Joe South  and Lynyrd Skynyrd. 

Live Covers On Record

Even the most seasoned and experienced of artists succumb to the allure of covers occasionally. The temptation is greatest when performing live and there's nothing quite like a band diving off left-field and bashing out a well known borrowed number. This may well be in the "encore"part of a gig, but it's usually aimed at being a crowd please as much as a recognition (perhaps) of the band's own early musical influences. These days, live covers have taken on a new life in the fad for de-luxe expanded editions of their early albums. With remastering and much a-trawling of the archives, an enlarged CD will have a much better sound quality - and the odd few unreleased numbers thrown in as well. One or two of these may be covers. 

Marvin Gaye
One of the most interesting can be found on the 1997 Fairport Convention studio album, Who Knows Where The Time Goes, released to celebrate their 30th year in the music business. Much of the album was standard folk-rock fare, but a live number from their 1995 Cropredy festival was included. This saw one-time member Richard Thompson join in with the band on a stirring version of a number originally made famous by Marvin Gaye - I Heard It Through The Grapevine. Thompson himself will admit that he's not the world's greatest singer, but this is a decent stab at this much-loved number. Roy Wood, late of The Move and Wizzard also joins in on guitar.

Fairport Convention's Simon Nicol with one time member Richard Thompson
"still doing it through the grapevine"  

Resurrection From The Vaults

The Kinks
Early days back in 1964
The final selection in this sub-category epitomises what a good cover song can do: remind us of songs from years gone by that might have had a moment in the sunlight, but have long since been overlooked. Indeed, many latterday covers are mistaken as originals by listeners as they simply aren't aware of the original. There have been many of these across the years such as Soft Cell's 1981 hit Tainted Love (originally done by Gloria Jones in 1964), Siouxie & The Banshees 1983 non-album single Dear Prudence (recorded by The Beatles for The White Album in 1969) and The Pretenders' 1980 hit Stop Your Sobbing (a Kinks number from 1964). Interestingly enough, that latter song was suggested to The Pretenders' Chrissie Hynde by her then partner, Kinkman Ray Davies. 


The Pretenders in 1980
Covering The Kinks
The more you look at singles across the years, the more you realise just how many have already been round the block some time before. A good song will always be a good song, pretty much whoever covers it: quality will out. It is probably more difficult here in the lofty uplands of 2014 for most of us to identify all these covers in the first place. With something like 60 years or more of the music charts, there's been a huge range of songs released, some just fleetingly, and others more impressed upon the public consciousness. Even bands such as The Beatles and The Rolling Stones started out with a high proportion of covers on their initial album releases.   



CHARITY EVENT/SPECIAL OCCASIONS


A musical phenomenon that has exploded in the past 20 years has been the Charity Song. It's not a new concept - George Harrison did it back in 1970 with his Concert For Bangladesh - but ever since the 1985 success of Live Aid, all manner of artists have been keen to be associated with fund-raising activities. It gives them a bit of credibility, it might even help boost sales - and in a healthy number of instances, it's something which they believe in. Allied to that is the release of singles or albums to celebrate special occasions or anniversaries: sometimes these are at the behest of a record company, sometimes the band themselves - and from time to time, the subject of the event or occasion.

This interests us because it provides opportunity a-plenty for cover songs to be part of the fund-raising or celebratory mix.

Bowie & Jagger - Dancing In the Street
Live Aid itself wasn't just the two main concerts at Wembley Stadium and in Philadelphia. There were a number of pre-recorded inserts, one of which was David Bowie and Mick Jagger doing a version of the Martha Reeves & The Vandellas hit, Dancing In The Street. It wasn't a patch on the original, but it did get a massive audience around the world. Another big hit was to enter the UK charts in 1989 in the wake of the Hillsborough football disaster in Sheffield, a disaster that saw 96 Liverpool fans die and over 700 more suffer injuries. A number of Merseyside artists got together - The Christians, Paul McCartney and Gerry Marsden - to cover the Liverpool anthem, Ferry Cross The Mersey. The emotional content of the song was important, rather the an the quality of the performance.

BBC Children In Need 1997
One of the best charity covers - and one formally endorsed as such by the original artist -  was released in 1997. It started life as a promotional song for the BBC and its wide range of musical content. Lou Reed's 1972 song Perfect Day was reworked by over 20 major artists, each contributing a line of vocals at most and, incredibly for such a number, the finished version worked really well. It was adopted by the BBC's Children In Need fund-raiser later that year, released as a single and went onto raise over £1.25m within a matter of a few weeks. As at 2012, it has sold over 1.6 million copies.




Ten years later, 2007 also saw an event - as opposed to charity - linked to the BBC which  this time featured an accompanying double-album. In that year, BBC Radio 1 celebrated its 40th anniversary and the album "BBC Radio 1: Established 1967" saw 40 artists contribute 40 cover songs to underline the massive role that the station had played in the world of UK pop and rock. The songs did vary in quality somewhat, but such artists as Franz Ferdinand (doing David Bowie's Sound & Vision) and The Foo Fighters (doing Wings' Band On The Run) certainly rose to the occasion. 



An intriguing celebratory triple-CD from Island Records also appeared in 2007. This was Island Life, a release supporting the label's 50th anniversary  since it was started by Chris Blackwell in Jamaica. Two of the CDs contained some fine selections of songs from the label's back catalogue, but the third saw current Island artists doing covers of older Island releases - and most gave a good account of themselves. Paul Weller did an interesting take of Nick Drake's River Man, Grace Jones had a go at Roxy Music's Love Is The Drug and U2's Within You Without You was tackled by Jonathan Jeremiah.





Peter Kay, Tony Christie
Still asking questions....
Comedian Peter Kay entered the charity fray in 2005 with a song aimed at raising funds for Comic Relief. He took the Tony Christie number Is This The Way To Amarillo to number 1 on the UK charts, assisted by a clever video and support from Tony Christie himself. Over 1.3 millions copies have since been sold. A further Comic Relief release followed in 2007: this time Peter Kay teamed up with Matt Lucas to do a version of I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles), originally a hit for Scottish duo The Proclaimers. This too sold plenty of copies, although didn't reach the coveted number 1 spot. 

GENRE TRIBUTES


 This is an interesting category.
The Nice
Made use of the classics
There's quite a long history of one musical genre doing covers borrowed from another musical genre. Many readers I am sure will remember the 1970s fashion for rock and pop songs to be reworked by classical orchestras. And why not, after all, bands such as The Nice had lifted wholesale classical pieces and given them the prog-rock treatment back in the late 1960s.(Their biggest hit was a version of Leonard Bernstein's music for America from the musical, West Side Story). It would be  a thankless task to review all genres and the songs they've borrowed, so here, we'll just take a flavour of some of the more intriguing ones. Inclusion doesn't necessarily mean that they're good covers, although that is broadly my aim. 



Hayseed Dixie
They like AC/DC
Bluegrass is a musical style that's enjoyed a bit of a resurgence in recent years probably, in no small measure, due to the work of artists like Alison Krauss. A band that started out as a hillbilly parody sort of act is Hayseed Dixie, a play on the name of Anglo-Aussie rockers AC/DC. Hayseed Dixie were formed in 2001 and aside from writing their own material, have become renowned for their bluegrass versions of a wide range of rock songs by bands such as the aforementioned AC/DC as well Kiss, Aerosmith and Bad Company. It is a conceit that can wear little thin, but they are seasoned practitioners and deliver exciting live shows too. 


It's not just rock that's been subject to the bluegrass treatment: in 2004, a group of Nashville-based musicians got together to cover an album's worth of songs from cosmic prog rockers, The Moody Blues. The album, needless to say, was called Moody Bluegrass. Some of the numbers strayed more into country territory and, in an odd sort of way, worked pretty well. 





The French musical New Wave?

 Over in France, the last ten years has seen a covers duo Nouvelle Vague have some success with their take on a range of rock, new wave and punk songs. Their very name itself means New Wave and is taken from the 60s French "new wave" film movement. The duo - Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux - augment their song with various guest singers and the output can perhaps be best described as lounge or bossa nova in style. Some of their interpretations work very well indeed whilst, it must be said, others are very much an acquired taste. Their version of Joy Division's Love Will Tear Us Apart  changes the whole temper of the song, but it still stands up despite the treatment.

Dread Zeppelin - with added Elvis
If we turn our attention to reggae and dub, there are all manner of cover songs done in this style - either by genuine reggae bands and artists, or by other acts intrigued by what sorts of sounds are possible. One of the more obvious contenders here is Dread Zeppelin, a Californian band formed back in 1989 and featuring as their lead singer, Greg Tortell, an Elvis impersonator. They've had quite some success with their reggae version of classic Led Zeppelin numbers and have released approaching twenty albums of studio and live material. They've also dabbled with other rock bands such as Cream, The Who,  Black Sabbath and Deep Purple, so it looks like their well has plenty of water before it runs dry. 



Easy Star All Stars
The dub aspect of genre covers is catered for by The Easy Star All Stars, a reggae and dub collective founded in 2003 in New York City. Their speciality is doing complete versions of whole albums in their dub style, the first being a treatment of Pink Floyd's Dark Side If the Moon which was released in 2003 as Dub Side Of The Moon. Other that followed include Radiohead's OK Computer (as Radiodread), The Beatles' Sgt Pepper (Easy Star's Lonely Hearts Dub Band) and in 2012, a version of Michael Jackson's Thriller (Thrillah). They've also released their own material and, being a collective, have had quite a throughput of members.

Sandi Thom sans flowers
Singer-songwriters occupy quite a berth in this category of genre covers and interpretations.There are far too many examples to go through, but a couple will serve as the variety that can be found. Sandi Thom is a Scots artist who first struck chart success with her single I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (With Flowers In My Hair) back in 2006. Since then she's re-invented herself as a not-at-all-bad blues singer and guitarist. Her most recent album, Covers Collection (2013) does what it says on the sleeve - and there's a particularly good version of The Foo Fighters' Times Like These on there. 




Sheryl Crow
Another singer-songwriter who has a decent history of fine covers (as well as forays into the indie, rock, blues and country genres) is Sheryl Crow. She got her big-break quite late in her musical career back in 1993 with an excellent album called Tuesday Night Music Club. The hit single - All I Wanna Do - showed the promise of what was to come. Five years later in 1998, she released her third album, The Globe Sessions, the UK version coming with a bonus song which she'd borrowed from rockers Guns 'N Roses, Sweet Child O' Mine. Her version starts with acoustic guitar and although it fills out with strings and other rock accoutrements, it's still an overtly singer-songwriterly take on the original. 


Maddy Prior...and girls

 Mention of singer-songwriters takes us neatly to the folk genre, again a veritable treasure trove of excellent covers, although we are taking care not to divert ourselves into "standards" or "Trad. arranged" territory. Maddy Prior started out on the folk circuit in the late 1960s with Tim Hart and in 1970, was a founder member of folk-rockers Steeleye Span. She's also had many side projects, a current one being Maddy And The Girls, a trio also comprising her daughter Rose Kemp and singer Abbie Lathe. On their 2010 album Bib & Tuck, they performed an acapella version of the Elton John number I Need You To Turn To.

The Ukelele Orchestra
of Great Britian
An instrument which has seen much popularity in recent years has been the ukelele, an instrument rescued from the hands of such as George Formby and used now by all manner of artists. The late Beatle George Harrison was a big fan but probably not as big a fan as The Ukelele Orchestra Of Great Britain who, as their name suggests, is a group of artists who play nothing but this simple four-stringed instrument. The UOGB was formed back in 1985  and operate today mainly as an eight-piece and have been a very busy band indeed. Whether it's turning their strings to Kate Bush (Wuthering Heights), David Bowie (Life On Mars) or, amazingly, The Sex Pistols (Anarchy In The UK), they are there and they deliver.  

Betty LaVette
Finally in this brief exploration, let's take a look at British rock numbers done by US soul and r&b artist, Betty LaVette. She's had quite a varied career since she started out in the 60s  - including a lengthy break in the 80s and 90s. A comeback loomed in the late 1990s and she's been pretty busy since then. In 2010 she released a covers album called Interpretations: The Great British Songbook. This included songs borrowed from such as The Beatles, Steve Winwood, The Stones, and Eric Clapton. Some of the covers are a bit mixed, but there are some fine versions too, particularly a cover of The Who's Love Reign O'er Me.


AND IN THE END


I'm very conscious that this potentially huge subject has received merely a brief and somewhat superficial examination. But, as I said back in Part 1, much of the content that could be excavated from Planet Covers probably isn't really worth the effort.

 I have looked at the main types of covers, looked at how they initially arose - and then opened up the different categories of borrowed song to provide some examples. Whether you believe that the song-links provided simply confirm your negative views of cover songs - or they have opened your eyes and ears to what is possible - I'll leave to you. What I can say is that cover songs don't seem to be diminishing in number and if you are fascinated by some of the more thoughtful ones, then don't forget that I include four of them in each edition of The Musical Box radio show, broadcast each Thursday night at 10pm. 

 Next week, I'll add a postscript to this series - a selection of my current twenty best cover songs. I'll make no promises for them, my mind will change frequently before then, but I hope that it'll act as a discussion point - and perhaps persuade you, dear reader, to let me know of songs you think I've missed.

 Alan Dorey
24th March 2014
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