Well, it's Friday, and you know what that means.
Yes, my hands on Asian manual catharsis technician Fah Lo Suee and I are heading off to Washington D.C. and the U.S Patent Office to register our revolutionary new Scrotum Deodorant Spray -- Elon Musk™!!!
But in the meantime, here's a hopefully fun project to help us wile away the idle hours until our return:
THE GREATEST COVER VERSIONS THAT NEVER WERE!!!
You know -- some really fabulous song you'd really like to hear some favorite artiste (solo or group) perform or record, but they never got (or haven't gotten) around to it (the bastards!!!).
Okay, my totally off the top of my head Top Ten is:
10. Vampire Weekend -- Here Comes My Baby [The Tremeloes]
My favorite three chord pop rock hit of all time performed by the guys who did "This Life"? I could die and go to heaven.
9. The Hold Steady -- The Boys Are Back in Town [Thin Lizzy]
They probably jammed on it at sound checks a thousand times -- if they're still an ongoing concern, it's about time they go public with it for gosh sakes.
8. The Pretenders -- Every Little Bit Hurts [Brenda Holloway]
My fave 60s soul ballad/torch song would be a natural for Chrissie Hynde, I suspect. Trivia note: The song was written by the same guy who wrote "Dirty Water." Pretty versatile dude, obviously.
7. Neko Case -- The First Cut Is The Deepest [Cat Stevens]
Because she'd do it better than Sheryl Crow, duh.
6. Steve Earle -- Street Fighting Man [The Rolling Stones]
C'mon -- this is the job he was born for.
5. Bob Mould -- Calvary Cross [Richard and Linda Thompson]
On the 1994 Thompson tribute album Beat the Retreat, Mould turned the rockabilly tinged "Turning of the Tide" into a killer piece of buzz-saw punk. I swoon to imagine what he could do with Thompson's most intensely doom-haunted song....
4. The Floor Models -- Second Choice [Any Trouble]
Hey -- as you can hear, we already ripped it off -- we should have just copped to it and covered it.
3. Elvis Costello and the Attractions -- One of Us Must Know (Sooner or Later) [Bob Dylan]
If anybody is going to do the most majestic "Blonde On Blonde" song of them all, it should be these guys.
2. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers -- 19th Nervous Breakdown [The Rolling Stones]
Jagger's snarl would have morphed into Petty's sly drawl pretty good, doncha think? It's a shame that, to my knowledge, Tom never got around to covering it.
And the number one cover I'd love to hear is....
1. Led Zeppelin -- Bits and Pieces [Dave Clark Five]
For obvious reasons.....
Alrighty then -- what would YOUR choices be?
And have a great weekend, everybody!!!
14 comments:
Robert Palmer- The Sweetest Taboo (Sade)
Mavis Staples- I'm Gonna Love You Just A Little Bit More (Barry White)
Marshall Crenshaw- Heaven & Hell (The Easybeats)
ooh Sal -- that Crenshaw/Easybeats thing! PLease let it happen someday!!!
The Rolling Stones - "Dead, Jail, or Rock 'n Roll" by Michael Monroe
Bruce Springsteen and the E Streeters should have covered Del Shannon's "Keep Searchin' (We'll Follow The Sun)".
Especially Del's high vocal bit during the song's fade-out ending.
DM
DM - Great choice on the Shannon cover. That's STILL my FAVORITE Del single (sorry, "Runaway") and, I agree, that high vocal bit at the end of the song is absolutely exciting.
Sal & Steve - Marshall Crenshaw has yet to cover "Heaven & Hell", but he DID do a cover of the Easybeats' "Made My Bed: Gonna Lie In It" on one of the E.P.s he released between 2012 and 2015. (On another of the E.P.s, he did the Move's "No Time").
Metallica - Green Tambourine (Lemon Pipers)
REM from the Life’s Rich Pageant era (i.e., before Michael Stipe decided he had Something Important To Say) doing Richard Thompson’s “Devonside”; that song is made for the Stipe lead vocal/Mills harmony vocal and melodic bass/Buck chimey guitar/Berry slamming the pagan skins treatment.
Paul McCartney doing Warren Zevon’s “Don’t Let Us Get Sick”, just Sir Paul and acoustic guitar. And given how brilliant was the Dawes cover (on Letterman) of Zevon’s “Desperados Under the Eaves”, they should tackle “The Indifference of Heaven” too. And a final Zevon cover suggestion - Joe Walsh doing “Detox Mansion”, with Joe obviously playing his take on the David Lindley lap steel, Waddy Wachtel on second guitar, Willie Weeks or Lee Sklar on bass, and the great Joe Vitale on drums.
Chris Whitley is just about uncoverable, but I think Jack White could take on “Phone Call From Leavenworth” and make it worthwhile.
Marshall Crenshaw + the remaining Smithereens doing Dwight Twilley’s “I’m On Fire”.
So...AC/DC - Eastbeats, Friday on my mind - after all they're brothers
Boston Dirty Water - just because
Mitch Ryder - Mony Mony
rob
rob -- Boston doing Dirty Water is freaking brilliant.
Staying with the Richard Thompson theme, I would love to hear him do Nick Drake's Which Will. I saw him a few years ago at an all-request show, and that was my request, but for whatever reason he didn't do it.
Marc
a cover that's already been done which i have enjoyed repeatedly over the years - although still less than a dozen times - is "louis armstrong's" rendition of "oops i did it again"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eO5SZTqmMt8
Somebody - maybe Bob Mould or Paul Westerberg - doing an amped-up cover of Steve Winwood's early 80s song "Still In The Game". I think that under the synthesizers on the original are some big chords that would sound great if they were blown up by loud, layered guitars (kind of like what the Red Rockers did when they covered Barry McGuire's "Eve Of Destruction".)
Grateful Dead - "I Fought the Law and the Law Won"
Joan Jett - "Feels Like Teen Spirit" (yes, I know she did it when Nirvana were inducted into the Hall of Fame, and she killed it. She should have recorded it).
Foo Fighters - "Won't Get Fooled Again"
A little late, but I actually thought of this in the car yesterday. I'm not sure why.
Tom Waits - "Fish Heads" by Barnes & Barnes
Post a Comment