How to play a good cover
Published by Matthias August 18th, 2006 in Editorial.
With Battle of the Bands mere weeks away, and a well advised ‘one cover’ rule in place, I was thinking about what makes a good cover. The mistake that pub bands seem to make again and again is trying to replicate tunes rather than pay homage to them. A good cover version should bounce away from the original, choosing a tangent that gives the song a new edge.
There’s lots of reasons that bands choose to cover other peoples songs. In the case of Battle of the Bands, it’s a good chance to let the audience know what the band is about and where they are coming from, and get everyone into the set. At Magfest, Sandi Thom’s cover of ‘Crazy’ by Gnarls Barkley was very well received and I think it added something to her performance. She played it as her encore and it was interesting to hear a completely back to basics lo-fi version of the tune. It was also a cheeky nod of respect, as she had knocked their song off the top of the charts with ‘punk rocker’ the week before. For your listening pleasure, here’s links to 6 other covers of Crazy in different styles. Let us know which one you think is most successful.
Ray Lomontagne & Poingly & The Twilight Sisters
Lily Allen has done a couple of good covers on the radio that I thought were worth a mention as she does them in a slightly different style to her own. It’s interesting to hear her singing straight, without the cheeky accent or the ‘a bit out of tune but it’s on purpose’ thing she likes to do.
I don’t see much point in covering songs if you’re not going to add anything different to them (if you’re in a successful band, at least). If you do that and it’s not quite as good as the original, especially if it’s a well-known and popular song, then you’re probably just going to be slated. McFly - Don’t Stop Me Now comes to mind… at least if you do something different with a song, even if it doesn’t sound amazing, you’re still being creative, so that deserves a bit of respect in itself.
As for the covers of Crazy, I’ll download them in a bit (or The Kooks’ version at least). I’ve heard Nelly Furtado’s version, mneh. I can’t say I’m too keen on the original anyway.
What’s Lily Allen doing covering Naive and Oh My God? Oh dear.
I can see alot of the bands at battle of the bands doing covers, even if it’s only going to be one. We’re doing no covers, there’s simply no point if you ask me. I would rather spend more time giving the crowd a new experience, get them to learn about us and be able to sing along to our songs. It’s easy to do covers, it’s not as easy to write songs. Yes, it can be hard work to change a cover song, but, up here, i’ve not heard one yet that doesn’t sound like the original.
I only like The Kook’s version of ‘Crazy’ because I heard that along time ago, it’s different and sung better if you ask me. Also, if you want to hear a good cover song I suggest downloading ‘Superman’ by The Receiving End of Sirens (Stereophonics originally). It’s one of the most interesting cover songs i’ve heard in a long time.
Also, Lilly Allen just shouldn’t make music, let alone covers.
Also, just for laughs. Try listening to ‘Wannabe’ by Zerbahead. Everyone remembers the originals
i used to play alot of covers in pub bands playing them exactly they way they’re played on albums, which gets pretty boring after a while!!these days i dont think theres much point if your not putting sum creative input into the cover or at least using your sound or influence to do sumthing really intersting with it! i play in a band that does a jazz/funk version on radioheads ‘just’ and pink floyds ‘echos’ now thats interesting stuff u dont here every day!
Am a big fan of ray lamontagne at the moment!didnt notice he had done a cover of that ‘crazy’ song ive heard to many times for my liking!!as for lilly allen am not even going to go there!!
big fan of the ray lamontagne’s version of Crazy, really well done and he completely turns the song into his unique style.
A quick addition:
The Darkness’ cover of Street Spirit by Radiohead is a kicker: http://hype.non-standard.net/search/the%20darkness%20street%20spirit/1/