THE NEW MUSICAL BOX

UNDER THE COVERS (Part 2 of 3)

Welcome to the second of my trilogy of pieces on the emotive subject of covers songs and the bands that perform them.

For many, liking a cover song is a guilty pleasure, for others, it's a sign of poor musical taste - and somewhere in the middle of all of this, there are some real gems to be found.

In the first part, I explored a brief history of the format and examined the different types of cover song: in this week's episode , I home in on the world of tribute and cover albums. It's a segment of the world of borrowed songs that's growing in popularity, so let's find out why this might be.

Needless to say, it's a huge area to cover,so we'll break it down into two episodes. This week, we focus on artists doing covers albums - next week, we turn to individual songs and generic compilations. 

If you'd like to catch up with the first episode, you can do that right here:

• Under The Covers - Part 1 

So, faders up, green light on - let the music commence.

SOME CATEGORIES

There are so many variations of Cover and Tribute albums that the best approach is to try and assign them to a small group of categories. In doing this I have had to make some arbitrary decisions on the odd few examples, but stick with me because it will be simpler to follow the narrative in this way. 

There are a handful that defy description and so reference will be made to them where and when it seems most appropriate.

Here are the categories:

• Artist Support
• These are releases put together to raise funds for an artist, either because they've fallen on hard times or are suffering ill-health and have medical bills to pay. Usually, their friends and supporters perform the relevant artist's own material.
• Album Reprise
• A classic album from years gone by is re-visited by a group of current performers. The album is repeated in sequence and there'll often be great variety in the treatments of the original songs.
• Artist Tribute - Compilation
• This is similar to Album Reprise, although the difference here is that the tribute takes songs from across their recorded output. These can be done in two ways - either as a group of artists providing their versions of songs or, a single artist providing all the covers. 
• Artist Covers - Individual Track
• This category contains by far and away the bulk of cover songs produced. Put simply, usually a 45rpm single or just a track or two on an album that are covers of pre-existing songs. For the purposes of this episode, we won't be looking at covers of *standards* or *traditional* songs.   
• Charity Event/Special Occasions
• Many of these releases take their cue from a key charity or fund-raising event: the choice of covers may be related to the occasion. It also includes tribute albums to artists who are no longer with us: the funding raised goes to support a charity or cause that was related to the artist. There are also covers in here derived from a specific anniversary or musical event.
• Genre Tributes
• A popular category which sees artists producing tribute or cover albums in a completely different musical genre from the original - a rock act is done by a bluegrass band, for example. 

We'll cover the first three this week - and then return in episode 3 to gather up the remaining four categories. 

ARTIST SUPPORT

The music business is a fickle one at the best of times.

Many artists and bands eke out a living with occasional financial highs and frequent periods of a low-budget existence. Matters can become more complicated when an artist suffers ill-health and finds it even more difficult to ply their trade. In true rock and roll lifestyle, some ailments may be self-inflicted, but when it comes to something like Multiple Sclerosis, a musician's career can be severely shortened. In the States where there is a limited entitlement to free health care, musicians are even more at risk of seeing their working days come to an end.

Victoria Williams - Water To Drink (2000)

This happened to singer-songwriter Victoria Williams, a fine Californian artist who took her inspiration from living in the country. Her songs were rooted in nature and her carefully wrought lyrics were highly descriptive of her local landscapes. Her first two albums were well received and by the early 1990s, she was getting due recognition for her talents. In 1993, though, she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. It's a progressive and debilitating disease whereby the coverings of the bodies nerve cells become inflamed causing damage to those found along the spine and in the brain. Drug treatments and physiotherapy can alleviate some of the symptoms, but it's a long and difficult journey. Victoria Williams found it hard to pay her medical bills and fortunately, a group of musical friends banded together to see what they could do.

Sweet Relief: A Benefit For
Victoria Williams - July 1993

The result was a tribute album called Sweet Relief: A Benefit For Victoria Williams. Released in the summer of 1993, it featured such artists as Lucinda Williams, Soul Asylum, Lou Reed, Michelle Shocked and Pearl Jam. Their take on Williams' idiosyncratic and endearing songs was both diverse and fascinating and it's an album that stands up in its own right today. Victoria Williams continued to write and record and despite having to manage her progressive condition, she has succeeded in releasing occasional albums up to the present day. Her most recent project was in 2012 when she recorded some vocals for an album by fellow singer songwriter Robert Deeble.



  
The Original: Victoria Williams - Crazy Mary 
The Cover:    Pearl Jam - Crazy Mary

Other "artist support" covers albums worthy of mention include one for Vic Chesnutt (a singer-songwriter who became a virtual quadriplegic following a car accident) and Roky Erikson, front man for The Thirteenth Floor Elevators (who had suffered severe mental difficulties). That for Vic Chesnutt was a follow-up to the one released for Victoria Williams, Sweet Relief having now become a musical charity. It was  called Sweet Relief II: Gravity Of the Situation and included covers performed by Garbage, REM, The Indigo Girls, Kristen Hersh and The Smashing Pumpkins amongst others. Sadly, Vic Chesnutt died in 2009 by taking an overdose of muscle relaxents, but Roky Erikson is still with us. His benefit album was released in 1990 and delights in the title Where The Pyramid Meets The Eye: A Tribute To Roky Erikson  and it started his recovery by providing enough funds for him to receive effective medical care. He since has gone on to tour and record again after several years in the wilderness.

Roky Erikson Tribute
"Where The Pyramid Meets
The Eye"

Vic Chesnutt Tribute
"Gravity Of The Situation"

  















ALBUM REPRISE

Back in episode one, we featured the classic example of this category, namely the NME-produced version of The Beatles' Sgt Pepper Sgt Pepper Knew My Father. It's fair to say that as in so many things, The Beatles dominate in this field. Swathes of musicians across the years have been influenced by the fab four in one way or another and it's bound to filter across into their work. Indeed, some bands such as Oasis, ELO and (in latter days) XTC have made their homage fairly explicit in their work. Mojo magazine here in the UK has added versions of Revolver, Abbey Road and The White Album to the mix - with varying degrees of success it must be said. Fans are very precious about The Beatles and rarely seem to countenance borrowed versions of their songs and yet, they are amongst the most covered bands in the world. 

Mojo July 2006
Revolver Reloaded

Mojo issued their first Beatles covers album with Revolver Reloaded, a cover-mount to their July 2006 issue. Some of the songs were transformed and there was a fascinating collection of artists who added their creativity to the Beatles' originals. The Handsome Family did a fine Americana version of Eleanor Rigby whilst Thea Gilmore did a spirited rendition of I Want To Tell You. Listening to it again now, it still holds up as a complete album, despite the variety of artists and treatments - and that must be a tribute to the strength of The Beatles' song-writing skills. 






The Original:  The Beatles - Eleanor Rigby
The Cover:     The Handsome Family - Eleanor Rigby 

Mojo September 2008
The White Album Recovered
Part 1

The following year (2007) saw Mojo revisit Sgt Pepper with Sgt Pepper - With A Little Help From His Friends, a different treatment from the NME compilation 20 years earlier. It was to be in 2008 that Mojo's "magnum opus" was issued - The White Album Recovered, their version of The Beatles' 1969 double LP The Beatles. It was issued as two CDs, one in September and the second  with the October issue. The majority of the tracks had been specially recorded for Mojo by the chosen artists, although - as with their other releases - the magazine did include some pre-existing cover songs to make up the numbers.  One of the most interesting covers was by Scots singer-songwriter Julie Fowlis with her gaelic version of Blackbird, truly an inspired piece of work. 


The Original:   The Beatles - Blackbird
The Cover:      Julie Fowlis - Blackbird (Lon-dubh)

Mojo March 2010
The Madcap Laughs Again

In 2009, Mojo went to town with firstly The Beatles' Abbey Road cover - Abbey Road Now - and then in December, the first part of Pink Floyd's The Wall, recast as The Wall Re-Built. Part two followed in January 2010 and, quite apart from the welcome change from everybody's favourite moptops, it also gave the chance for some longer pieces to get the Mojo treatment. Next, in March that year, original Pink Floyd member Syd Barrett received the treatment for his first solo release The Madcap Laughs.This became The Madcap Laughs Again and featured covers by such as Hawkwind, REM, Marc Almond and Robyn Hitchcock. Hawkwind did a particularly interesting and typically space-rock version of Long Gone.


The Original:   Syd Barrett - Long Gone
The Cover:      Hawkwind - Long Gone

Mojo - February 2011
Harvest Revisited

Mojo pressed on - September 2010 saw The Beatles' Let It Be recast as Let It Be Revisited and February 2011 saw a change of tack with a full album cover of Neil Young's Harvest: this was Harvest Revisited. As might be expected, the artists involved were mainly singer-songwriters and there were some fine interpretations from such as The Smoke Fairies, The Zutons' Neville Skelly and Doug Paisley. I have quite a soft spot for The Smoke Fairies, a highly talented duo from Sussex and their version of Alabama is really out of the top draw.






The Original:    Neil Young - Alabama
The Cover:      The Smoke Fairies - Alabama

Mojo - January 2013
Rumours Revisited

By October 2011, Mojo had returned to Pink Floyd with Return To The Dark Side Of The Moon which, uniquely, took both Dark Side Of The Moon and Wish You Were Here and put them onto the one disc. June 2012 saw The Beach Boys Pet Sounds appear as Pet Sounds Revisited (with a fine version of God Only Knows by The Flaming Lips), and in the following month and it was a return to the Fab Four with Yellow Submarine Resurfaces. Fleetwood Mac got the work-over in January 2013 with Rumours Revisited (and a great treatment of You Make Loving Fun by Canadian indie-rockers Besnard Lakes, a band who gave it a bit more of a beefier feel and plenty of echoing guitars ) and as at the time of writing (March 2014), no further Mojo album covers have subsequently appeared.


The Original:    Fleetwood Mac - You Make Loving Fun
The Copy:        Besnard Lakes - You make Loving Fun

Booker T & The MGs - 1970
McElmore Avenue

One of the more interesting - and rare - album covers includes The Rolling Stones' Exile On Main Street which was recreated by US punk and garage rock band Pussy Galore as a 500-release limited edition tape cassette back in 1986. It hasn't seen a full CD release although for completists,  four of the tracks did appear on their 1992 album, Corpse Loves Back. In 1970, Booker T & The MGs - better known for their organ driven singles such as Time Is Tight - had a go at reworking The Beatles' Abbey Road, barely a year after its release and some 40 years before Mojo magazine repeated the exercise. Front man Booker T Jones said at the time "The music was just incredible so I felt I needed to pay tribute to it". The album was called McElmore Avenue and even the sleeve design paid tribute to the original. 

ARTIST TRIBUTE - COMPILATION

I could end up being beseiged by artist tribute albums in this section. There have been so many produced across the years that it appears difficult at first to know where to begin. However, it's clear on surveying the mountains of vinyl and CDs that there are a few common patterns that emerge:

• The same top handful of acts are subject to compilation 
• Compilations reappear in later years under different names
• A large proportion of the albums are low-end, poor quality products

Rather than categorize them in some complex way, a good way forward is to pick on a few interesting artists and look at examples of their work, those that have inspired cover songs. As noted earlier in this episode, an Artist Tribute Compilation can either be a single band or act doing covers of their chosen artist - or a mix of bands producing cover songs for an artist which are then collected into a single release. The focus here is on album or EP releases.

Joni Mitchell
Canadian singer-songwriter supreme
Many songs have seen cover versions
(and she's not averse to doing her own)

So, who are the most popular artists being covered? Name just about any commercially popular act and they'll inspire cover releases. Whether it's Bob Dylan, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Neil Young, The Grateful Dead, Fleetwood Mac, Pink Floyd, Leonard Cohen, Sandy Denny, Joni Mitchell or Johnny Cash - there are plenty of them. They are mainly established acts, acts that have had plenty of years to sell significant numbers of singles and LPs and - let's not forget - plenty of time for their music to get into the public consciousness. It's rare for recent bands to have covers made of their work, but there are the odd few although nothing like the number that existed back in the 1950s and early 1960s as noted in Episode 1. 

Bob Dylan - From Duluth to
Greenwich Village
Most Covered?

Judging by a rough and ready trawl through my record database, it seems that Bob Dylan is one of the most popular artists to have his songs covered on an album. This  shouldn't come as any surprise: he's written hundreds of memorable songs, has had a 50 year career and more - and is the sort of artist who influences a wide range of people. It was The Byrds, that US band who started out in the wake of The Beatles' invasion of the USA who were amongst the first acts to ride on Dylan's coat tails. No fewer than three official Byrds compilation albums have been released which collect together their versions of Dylan's songs. The songs - recorded at different stages in their career - are strikingly different from the Dylan originals and that is mainly down to their three-piece harmonies and more overtly pop-approach. The first release was 1970's The Byrds Sing Dylan, an eleven track album which was followed in 1979 by The Byrds Play Dylan and then finally in 2001 with The Byrds Play The Songs Of Bob Dylan.   

The Byrds Play Dylan
Second of three Dylan covers albums - 1979

   
The Cover:       The Byrds - Chimes Of Freedom

Other artists who have produced Dylan covers albums include The Hollies (The Hollies Sing Dylan), Judy Collins (Judy Sings Dylan Just Like A Woman), Steve Howe (Portrait Of Bob Dylan) and Bryan Ferry (Dylanesque). This is quite apart from the myriad of collections of covers produced by record labels over the years, songs drawn from individual covers done by their roster of artists - and quite a few *unofficial*collections too.

Judy Collins Sings Dylan Just Like A Woman (1993) 

The Cover:  Judy Collins - Tomorrow Is A Long Time
  

Deadicated (1991)
Excellent covers album in
honour of The Grateful Dead

One of the most appealing and well-thought out covers albums is Deadicated, a 1991 tribute to The Grateful Dead. The song selection is sufficiently adventurous and a good range of top quality artists was employed to produce the covers themselves. For several of the numbers, a special backing band was convened to fill out the sound, but there's no doubting that it's a classic release and deserving of repeated plays. In many ways, it's an archetypal covers album: it looks at the whole career of the band, chooses sympathetic artists - and allows them to add their own twists and turns to the numbers. 





The Original:   The Grateful Dead - Uncle John's Band   
The Cover:      The Indigo Girls - Uncle John's Band

Sometimes artists are exceptional song-writers but, in their lifetime, may not always have received the recognition that they deserved. With the passage if time, that can change - especially with re-releases of old albums in deluxe formats with bonus tracks. In her time, Sandy Denny was well known in certain circles, but it's only since her untimely death in 1978 that her songs have been recognised for what they are, truly exceptional sets of lyrics that bare her soul. There have been two interesting covers albums - one which features Thea Gilmore putting music to a set of song lyrics that had been unrecorded (Don't Stop Singing) and a genuine tribute album by Vicki Clayton, It Suits Me Well (1988). For several years, Vicki Clayton's uncanny knack to get into the feel of Denny's music ensured that she was used by Denny's old band Fairport Convention at various live concerts and their annual Cropredy Festival to *play the role* of Sandy on stage.

The Original:    Fairport Comnvention (Sandy Denny) - White Dress
The Cover:       Vicki Clayton - White Dress

Sand Denny - Much Missed

Nick Drake
Tortured Troubador

Way To Blue
The Songs Of Nick Drake (2010)

Another fine artist, a great troubador who recorded just three albums for Island Records before taking his life in 1974 was Nick Drake. He was by all accounts a shy and introverted artist, one who could write glorious songs and yet find himself unable to go on tour and play live. His singing style - sometimes otherworldly and lost, other times considered and rootsy - was initially an acquired taste and his albums barely sold any copies in his lifetime. But as with Denny, his fame only grew in the years after his death and many artists have since acknowledged his influence on their music. The albums have been released several times since and in 2010, his original producer Joe Boyd put together a series of concerts featuring guest musicians singing his songs. The London show - at The Barbican - was recorded and shown on BBC4 TV and an album Way To Blue: The Songs Of Nick Drake was also released filled with those sublime songs being covered by artists such as Robyn Hitchcock, Teddy Thompson, Lisa Hannigan and Green Gartside.  

The Original:   Nick Drake - River Man 
The Cover:     Teddy Thompson - River Man

Leonard Cohen - A Tip Of The Hat to
this legendary artist

One final example is also a singer-songwriter and, again that probably underlines the importance of the original material when any musician considers doing a cover version. He is Leonard Cohen, a veteran of the 60s who is enjoying something of a renaissance in the present day and playing to sell out concert halls across the USA and Europe. Originally a poet -and let's be honest, not the most gifted of vocalists - Cohen made the best of his singing style to create a whole sub-genre all of his own. Whether it's conspiratorial, confessional, sexually-charged or highly descriptive, there was something about the way he wrote and sang - and the way he performed. Several covers albums have been produced lauding his talent and these include Famous Blue Raincoat from Jennifer Warnes, Tower Of Song from Tom Jones and an intriguing 1991 compilation called I'm Your Fan. 

The Original:    Leonard Cohen - First We Take Manhattan
The Cover:      Jennifer Warnes - First We Take Manhattan

So, there we have it for the moment.

We've had a look at the first of the three categories I developed at the start of this episode: we've looked at covers albums produced by a band or artist that are devoted to a single performer. We've barely scratched the surface, but with luck and a little bit of planning, we've seen some fascinating variety.

Next week, we'll pick off the remaining categories as we focus on individual tracks and mixed compilations of one sort or another.

Do please join me then.

Alan Dorey
16th March 2014