Each week I'm posting a random or not-so-random cover song. Only the current week's track will be available but if you see a past one you'd like, contact me and we'll make arrangements.
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Sunday, October 4th, 2009
Manic Street Preachers cover Nirvana
WikipediaSaying I’m excited about tonight’s Manic Street Preachers show at the Phoenix has a whiff of understatement about it. As does that previous sentence. To be clear: I am very excited about this show. Not just because they’re a band I’ve liked/loved through high points and low (and there’ve been some low, yes), or because they’ve unexpectedly put out one of my favourite records of the year in Journal For Plague Lovers, but because I hadn’t expected them to ever tour North America again. But they’re here, tonight, at the Phoenix, and I’m dedicating this week’s cover to them.
They did make it easy, though, having recorded no shortage of covers in their long history, both expected and unexpected. This one counts as more the former as it’s hard to imagine that the Manics weren’t inspired by what Nirvana was doing to rejuvenate loud, raw guitar rock in the early ’90s though their first few records borrowed more from the glammy arena rock that Nirvana is credited with slaying. This particular recording comes from a BBC Radio 1 session circa 1999, Nirvana having long since disintegrated and the Manics were entering a creatively fallow period, and has James Dean Bradfield turning the “Been A Son”‘s snarling punk into an acoustic blues moan – wholly inverted but still stirring. It was released on the 2003 b-sides/rarities compilation Lipstick Traces: A Secret History.
Kurt Cobain took his own life over 15 years ago, yet the Nirvana vaults have yet to be fully plundered (or re-plundered) – November 3 sees a couple of new releases coming, a 20th anniversary edition of their debut Bleach – which features a live version of “Been A Son” on the bonus live disc – and recording of their 1992 performance at the Reading Festival in the UK on both CD and DVD. That set also contained “Been A Son” – I expect the clip below is the same footage as on the DVD, but hopefully that’ll look and sound better. And not have the time code stamped on it.
The Flint Journal has an interview with Manics drummer Sean Moore. And neither Manics or especially Nirvana-related (though sort of), Spin has compiled their list of the top 50 covers of all-time, with streaming audio. If you like hearing people doing other peoples’ songs, check it out.
MP3: Manic Street Preachers – “Been A Son”
Video: Nirvana – “Been A Son” (live at Reading 1992)
Sunday, September 27th, 2009
Sufjan Stevens covers R.E.M.
Frank YangSince being Mr Ubiquity back in 2005, circa Illinois, Sufjan Stevens has largely gone quiet – a collection of Christmas carols here, a tribute to a New York expressway there, but certainly not a new album by conventional standards, and certainly not a continuation of his fifty states initiative.
So by those standards, this Autumn is a bounty for Sufjan fans – there’s the October 6 release of Run Rabbit Run , a rejigged and re-orchestrated version of his 2001 electronic salute to the Chinese zodiac Enjoy Your Rabbit and then a couple weeks later the multimedia extravaganza The BQE on October 20. And then there’s the intimate Fall tour which brings Mr Stevens and who-knows-what theme to Lee’s Palace on Thursday night – there don’t appear to be any costumes this time around, but there are new songs and old favourites drawn mainly from Illinois and Seven Swans. What you hear there is the sound of no one complaining.
It also gives me an excuse to dig up this week’s brief but lovely selection, Mr Stevens covering R.E.M. solo at Judson College in November, 2003. And even though work has only just begun on a new album, R.E.M. are putting out a new record this Fall in the form of the cryptically-titled Live At The Olympia In Dublin, out October 27.
MP3: Sufjan Stevens – “The One I Love”
Video: R.E.M. – “The One I Love”
Sunday, September 20th, 2009
The Antlers cover My Bloody Valentine
Chris ShontingHaving now gotten to the point where I can listen to The Antlers’ Hospice without having a panic attack – mostly – I’ve set about checking out some of their earlier recordings via the interwebs. Beyond that latest record the trio are mostly a tabula rasa to me, so there’s no real reason for me to be surprised that they’ve done a My Bloody Valentine cover… but I was.
And yet the way they’ve reinterpreted it makes perfect sense. Replacing Kevin Shields’ trademark “glide” guitar with heavily effected slide maintains the original’s wobbly intent without resorting to mimicry and Peter Silberman’s hazy, quaaluded vocals come at the dream-pop standard from a different angle. Fresh, yet faithful. Best I can tell, this recording was never part of a formal release, just one of those things that trickles out online from the ether. And thank goodness for that.
The Antlers are on the road and will be in Toronto on Thursday evening for two performances – an in-store at Criminal Records at 6PM and a headlining show at the Horseshoe later that night. Either/or/both highly recommended. You can stream a session with the band at KDHX. The touring portion of the My Bloody Valentine reunion has mostly wound down, with just a single festival appearance in December remaining, so hopefully they’ll get to dealing with those long-promised reissues, unreleased and new material. Yeah, right.
MP3: The Antlers – “When You Sleep”
Video: My Bloody Valentine – “When You Sleep” (live in San Francisco 2008)
Sunday, September 13th, 2009
Pernice Brothers cover The Psychedelic Furs
AmazonPeople probably don’t believe Joe Pernice, he of the gorgeously depressive folk-pop, when he says he’s a huge fan of early ’80s British new wave with its mechanical tones and synthetic textures. And so perhaps to prove it, he covers it. A lot. Or he did, anyways – his latest release It Feels So Good When I Stop is almost all covers and while it ranges from ’70s AM pop through classic country and ’90s college rock, his Anglophile side is pretty much ignored. But then, the album is meant to soundtrack his new book of the same name, and it’s not autobiographical, not at all. No sir.
Digging back through his Pernice Brothers and Chappaquiddick Skyline periods, however, reveal a trifecta of superb covers from the era – New Order’s “Leave Me Alone”, The Chameleons’ “Up The Down Escalator” and this one of The Psychedelic Furs’ “Love My Way”, released as a b-side to the “Clearspot” single. Maybe someday Joe will release another covers album comprised solely of this stuff. But probably not.
Pernice plays a combination show/book reading at the Dakota Tavern on September 24 while The Psychedelic Furs are teaming up with The Happy Mondays for a nostalgia tour that hits the Kool Haus on October 14. The Chicago Tribune has an interview with Pernice.
MP3: Pernice Brothers – “Love My Way”
Video: The Psychedelic Furs – “Love My Way”
Sunday, September 6th, 2009
Taken By Trees cover Guns N' Roses
Jenny MortsellEven when in The Concretes, Victoria Bergsman wrapped her distinctive, sleepy vocals around unexpected cover versions of songs by acts as different as The Rolling Stones and Take That. So when in 2008, under her solo guise as Taken By Trees, she released a 7″ with an a-side rendition of the Guns N’ Roses classic tune, it was less a “WTF?” moment than a, “huh, okay”. Bergsman doesn’t do anything especially revolutionary besides play and sing it in exactly the way you might expect – simply and winsomely, accompanied by piano, acoustic guitar and some spare but effective drums – but that approach is different enough from the bombast of the original to make it distinctive.
Where Bergsman does surprise is on her new album East Of Eden, which is out this week. It was largely recorded in Pakistan and very much bears the sonic imprint of the region on its instrumentation, arrangements and ineffable “vibe” but is still very much recognizable as the gentle folk-pop which she plies. It’s a delicate line to walk, how to incorporate such strong outside influences into one’s own work without losing one’s identity, but Bergsman mostly pulls it off. And it contains yet another cover – Animal Collective’s “My Girls” recast as “My Boys”.
Meanwhile, Guns N’ Roses are still insane.
MP3: Taken By Trees – “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
Video: Guns N’ Roses – “Sweet Child O’ Mine”
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