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.
If you are the copyright holder of the current track and wish it to be taken down please contact me to do so.
Sunday, August 12th, 2012
The Sunshine Fix covers The Beatles
Frank YangIt’s almost a couple weeks on since the untimely passing of Olivia Tremor Control and Sunshine Fix frontman Bill Doss, and there are still few to no public answers as to what happened to end his life at 43. It’s a small bit of comfort that both suicide and foul play have been ruled out, as either of those scenarios would have been an extra level of cruel on top of everything, but that just leaves randomness and that really doesn’t offer much comfort either.
What has emerged, however, is a portrait of a man who was genuinely loved and respected by friends, peers, and those who actually knew him. It’s the sort of thing that, as a fan who only knows someone through their work, you would hope to be true but never know for sure. Until you do. The best of the tributes are collected in two pieces at Athens, Georgia’s Flagpole and their Homedrone blog, but there’s also pieces at PopMatters and Vice. And unabashed E6/OTC devotees The Poison Control Center have written some words but also paid musical tribute by way of a Daytrotter session of Olivia Tremor Control covers.
For my part, I’d like to re-surface this recording that I posted once nine years ago. I didn’t have any real information on it then and I don’t have anymore now, but it did come off the official Sunshine Fix website as a free download and sounds very much like Doss recorded his own, one-man version of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band closer. And it’s a perfect choice, really; that record by that band is one of the best touchstones for what the Elephant 6 both strove for and transcended, and that song is just so poignant.
MP3: The Sunshine Fix – “A Day In The Life”
Video: The Beatles – “A Day In The Life”
Sunday, August 5th, 2012
A Place To Bury Strangers cover David Bowie
ManimalIt’s amazing what a bed of face-shredding distortion can do to the character of a song. If Oliver Ackermann, who when he’s not fronting Brooklyn sonic anarchists A Place To Bury Strangers is designing and selling the tools of his trade via Death By Audio guitar pedals, needs to offer more compelling evidence for what his goods can do than his own discography, he can certainly point at this David Bowie cover from the 2010 tribute album We Were So Turned On.
The original, which appeared on The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust & The Spiders From Mars, was no bit of politeness for its time, but with its old school rock’n’roll roots showing and general sense of gleeful abandon, it was still a pretty fun-sounding number. The A Place To Bury Strangers version, on the other hand, thanks to the white noise treatment and echoey vocals, sounds downright sinister – their Suffregette City doesn’t sound like anywhere you’d like to visit. No sir.
Toronto, on the other hand, is somewhere A Place To Bury Strangers seem to like visiting – their closing performance at the ALL CAPS! island festival next Sunday night will be their third time through in less than six months, all in support of their latest album Worship. This year marks the 40th anniversary of Ziggy Stardust, but David Bowie isn’t doing anything in particular to celebrate beyond the obligatory reissues – and you can’t blame him. He’s probably afraid to come out of retirement lest someone gets Gary Busey and a hologram Sam Kinison to do another cringeworthy introduction to a public appearance.
MP3: A Place To Bury Strangers – “Suffragette City”
Video: David Bowie – “Suffragette City” (live on the International Rock Awards, 1990)
Sunday, July 29th, 2012
Blur covers The Who
discogs.comConsidering their legacies as amongst the most artistically creative and commercially successful British rock bands of their respective eras are rather assured, it’s easy to forget that both Blur and The Who started out as pretty bright-eyed, eager-to-please guitar pop bands. Which is not to say that their earlier works were overly simplistic or lacked ambition – it’s arguable that what they accomplished within the constraints of the 3-minute pop song was as impressive as anything did once free to indulge their creative impulses – so hearing young Blur cover young Who is really quite invigorating.
The track comes from a 1993 tribute album called Who Covers Who?, when Blur were rising stars on the back of Modern Life Is Rubbish and The Who were celebrating their thirtieth anniversary not with a reunion but a box set in the excellent Thirty Years Of Maximum R&B. Fast-forward another 19 years, and it’s Blur who are putting out the box set in the career-spanning Blur 21, out next week, coinciding with what may or may not be a final burst of activity culminating in their Olympics-closing show at Hyde Park on August 12.
The Who know a thing or two about trying to wrap up a career, but numerous break-ups and the deaths of Keith Moon and John Entswistle haven’t been able to keep Pete Townshend and Roger Daltry down – their latest return to action comes in the form of a massive North American tour where they’ll recreate 1973 rock opera Quadrophenia live. They’ll bring that to the Air Canada Centre on November 23.
MP3: Blur – “Substitute”
Video: The Who – “Substitute”
Sunday, July 22nd, 2012
Spoon covers The Rolling Stones
Frank YangIf you’ve been thinking we’re about due for a new Spoon record, what with a good two and a half years having passed since 2010’s Transference, then I’d say you’re probably right. However that’s not going to be happening – not anytime soon, at least – because frontman Britt Daniel has been busy working with Dan Boeckner, ex-Handsome Furs and Wolf Parade, and Sam Brown from New Bomb Turks in a new project called Divine Fits – their debut album A Thing Called Divine Fits is due out August 28.
Last Thursday night, July 12, marked the 50th anniversary of the first ever gig by The Rolling Stones, and while a new record from the legends is anticipated by exactly no one, it’s been widely expected that the band will stage some kind of anniversary tour to mark the event, with Keith Richards having confirmed they’ve been rehearsing and Mick Jagger speculating that they could be back on stage as early as this Fall.
What’s one got to do with the other? Not much, save that it lets me post this recording of Spoon covering the Stones recorded in September 28 at the Fillmore West in San Francisco; it was a fixture of their live sets circa Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, with the band frequently closing their shows with it. That’s all.
MP3: Spoon – “Rocks Off” (live @ The Fillmore West, 2008)
Video: The Rolling Stones – “Rocks Off” (live @ Twickenham Stadium, 2003)
Sunday, July 15th, 2012
Grizzly Bear cover Hot Chip
TripleJGrizzly Bear specialize in complex, artful folk-rock built around virutostic musicianship and otherworldly harmonies. Hot Chip excel at cerebral yet danceable electro-pop that’s as catchy as it is clever. So naturally when the former covers the latter, the result would sound like… something you’d hear at a coffee house?
Recorded during a radio session in January 2010 for Australian radio station Triple J and seemingly with just Ed Droste and Daniel Rossen representing the Brooklyn band, it seems like kind of a straight strummy cover at first but when the organ comes in and Rossen lends his harmonies on the chorus, it turns downright haunting with still just a minimum of fuss. Okay, coffee houses should be so lucky to have their acts sound like this.
Grizzly Bear have released details of their follow up to 2009’s Veckatimest, targeting a September 18 release date for Shields with accompanying tour date at Massey Hall on September 26. Hot Chip are currently on tour in support of In Our Heads and are at The Sound Academy tonight.
MP3: Grizzly Bear – “Boy From School”
Video: Hot Chip – “Boy From School”
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