# Awesome and Original Covers



## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

Any style!






^ In a bizarre turn of events, the top comment sums this up really well.











^ Easily my favourite version.


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## MJongo (Aug 6, 2011)




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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Stairway to Heaven Rolf Harris

[video]Stairway to Heaven Rolf Harris [/video]


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Maybe this is more in the spirit of the thread!

Michael Hedges - Come Together


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## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

That reminds me...


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## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

I can't find a Youtube video for it, but Dan Reeder's version of Whiter Shade of Pale:

http://danreeder.bandcamp.com/track/a-whiter-shade-of-pale


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## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

Potentially too pleasant, but effortlessly charming (This goes for the majority of things they've done, though).


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Devo - Satisfaction
Japan - All Tomorrow's Parties
Siouxsie & The Banshees - Dear Prudence
Four Tops - If I Were A Carpenter
The Clash - Junco Partner

Sorry - cannot offer youtube links due to technical difficulties.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Doug Parkinson - Dear Prudence

could start a thread on Beatles covers or Stairway to Heaven......


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## Eva (Mar 2, 2013)

Sometimes covers are better than the originals 

This is a great example:

Orginal song: Kraftwerk - Das Model
Cover: Accordion Cover by Trio Fratres: Das Model

Other great accordion covers:

Accordion Cover: Frument Project - Poker Face
Queen Accordion Cover - Bohemian Rhapsody
The Beatles Accordion Cover by The Buttons
Accordion Cover: Englishman in New York


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

Tony Rice doing Gordon Lightfoot tunes is a pleasure to listen to. Tony is a great guitarist, and I'm a big fan of all of his Rounder releases. Plus you get to hear all the other great players like Jerry Douglas and Sam Bush.


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

stevie ray vaughan
superstition


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## jani (Jun 15, 2012)

One of the best covers ever made!


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## LordBlackudder (Nov 13, 2010)




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## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

Good lord, what a voice this man had. You can really see how much of the arrangement of House of the Rising Sun was up to him.


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## EddieRUKiddingVarese (Jan 8, 2013)

Mesa said:


> Good lord, what a voice this man had. You can really see how much of the arrangement of House of the Rising Sun was up to him.


Don't tell Eric Burdon that - he'll kill you. Apparently, due to printing limitation on the original record of House of the Rising Sun (word space) only Alan Prices name was attributed to the songs arrangement- with none of the rest of the animals ever getting any money from the record.


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## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

Aha, i found that tune about 2 minutes after browsing the HotRS wiki and read that exact fact! 

I seem to recall my dad saying it was based on a piano exercise he was taught as a teenager - have a bash at playing the guitar line with one hand on a keyboard, one finger per note, it's easy and awfully fun.


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## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Oh, I thought you meant album covers! Sorry, never mind.


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## aleazk (Sep 30, 2011)

^^^"Jesus use me"... I'm afraid to ask what for!.

------------------------------------------------------

Original: "Maria" by Bernstein: 




Cool jazz cover by Brubeck:


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## Mesa (Mar 2, 2012)

Tops the superb original, in my humblest.


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## Katie (Dec 13, 2013)

Talk about definitive incarnations...back-to-back the Alabama Song (Kurt Weill and 100 other atrocious performances) and Backdoor Man (Howlin' Wolf):






K


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

That got me thinking about more Weill & Brecht numbers


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

and another style


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

Bowie's cover of a Jacque Brel song






compare to the original,


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## techniquest (Aug 3, 2012)

"Entangled" by Genesis covered by Pino Lettieri - awesome!






"Gates of Delerium" by Yes from the 'Relayer' album covered by some really clever person (people?) in Japan with vocals using the Vocaloid 3 'Oliver' program. It's bizzarre and brilliant!


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## Rehydration (Jun 25, 2013)

In terms of Christmas cheer...
This. ALL OF THIS.


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## LordBlackudder (Nov 13, 2010)




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## Jos (Oct 14, 2013)

. Don't talk (put your head on my shoulder) ; Beach boys





. Paint it black; Rolling Stones

Fennesz, remarkable laptopguitarist, post-modern deconstuctivism...or something like that.....

Cheers,
Jos


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## Exordiom (Nov 27, 2013)

Dexter Gordon - Love for Sale


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## Pantheon (Jun 9, 2013)

For metal fans especially, I think this version definitely beats Adele by far : 





And this woman truly rocks to high heaven...






For those who know this brilliant duo, well you know what I mean


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## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Johnny Winter covering Bob Dylan's Highway 61 Revisited:


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

The late Kevin Gibert doing Zep's 'Kashmir' from his CD, 'Thud'.






I've never been a fan of 'Kashmir' but I really like this version.


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## Simon Moon (Oct 10, 2013)

Now defunct Dutch prog-metal band, Lemur Voice, doing a cool version of 'Beat It'.

Complete with jazz breaks, with trumpet.


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## Alypius (Jan 23, 2013)

Brad Mehldau doing a cover of Nick Drake's "River Man" from his _Live in Tokyo_ (Nonesuch, 2004)






For those who don't know the original:


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## cwarchc (Apr 28, 2012)

The ukelele orchestra of Great Britian with Bowie's Life on Mars
These guys have some fun covers


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## 38157 (Jul 4, 2014)




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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

One of my favorites: Wilma covers The Seeker's "Georgy Girl" --






and this, from the Butthole Surfers -- "American Woman" (originally by Canadian rockers The Guess Who)






How about one from the Meat Puppets, called "Tumblin' Tumbleweeds", a song which has been done by every cowboy out there (among them Gene Autry and Roy Rogers), but never quite like this:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

I really enjoy great covers and I know a whole slew of them, but they are not all that current, as I haven't kept up with rock music for quite some time 

Nina Hagen did a lot:






It's called TV Glotzer (TV Junkie, roughly), which is a cover of the Tubes' White Punks on Dope.

Another mega-favourite:






This is much better than Norman Greenbaum's original and really gets the Spirit into you.


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Morning Dew was originally written by Canadian folk singer Bonnie Dobson. It is not a very memorable song, performed in that style, but it has become a classic in the hands of many others.

Probably, it was the Grateful Dead that made it famous, but it was also performed by rockers Nazareth, who do quite an acceptable 'straight' version, but the finest version was done by German avantgarde/industrial rockers Einstürzende Neubauten:






They also covered Lee Hazelwood's Sand, which is definitely quite a gem in their hands:






One of their earliest covers is of Cabaret Voltaire's Nag Nag Nag. Here, they do a tongue-in-cheek stripped down version:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Lydia Lunch began in the _no wave_ scene and quickly established herself as the punk goddess supreme. She did a stunning song with Einstürzende Neubauten, Thirsty Animal, which was released by the band on a later album of collected early tracks.

However, one of her earliest hits, with her band, 8 Eyed Spy, featuring guitarist Rowland S. Howard, is a cover of the Creedence Clearwater Revival's Run through the Jungle. Lydia gives us a spine-tingling version that will make you feel the terror:






She, along with Rowland S. Howard, do a Lee Hazelwood cover of Some Velvet Morning, that takes the song to the depths:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

I don't know who wrote the old standard, Memphis... perhaps Chuck Berry or somebody like that. You've all heard, and forgotten, it. Well, John Cale, who was a member of the Velvet Underground and who worked with La Monte Young and Tony Conrad, gave us the definitive version, using his viola to take us to the heights of ecstasy:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Bryan Ferry, singer of the legendary classic art rock band Roxy Music, covered a lot of Bob Dylan's songs, and he does them much better. Here's one of my favourites, from his album of Dylan covers, Dylanesque:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Here, Blixa Bargeld, lead singer of the Einstürzende Neubauten and former guitarist of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, performs the Can classic, Soul Desert:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Wanted Man was composed by Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds give us the definitive version:






Cave also covered many other songs, even having devoted an entire album, Kicking against the Pricks, to them. He does the Velvet Underground and Nico's classic, All Tomorrow's Parties...






and Hey Joe on the album, plus many other great-and-not-so-greats (that he makes great):






There is no better version than this one, that captures the dread and angry delirium.


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

I really like this Mexican mariachi version of Hey Joe, by Willy Deville:






I suggest this as a very good second version. While Cave gives us insanity and dissolution, Deville gives us joyous release and freedom.


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## SONNET CLV (May 31, 2014)

"Like Someone in Love" composed in 1944 by Jimmy van Heusen, with lyrics by Johnny Burke, for the 1944 film _Belle of the Yukon_ (in which it was sung by Dinah Shore) has always been a great song:

Frank Sinatra made it famous in his 1954 recording on _Songs For Young Lovers_:






Here's Bjork's version, which is simply stunning and remains my favorite cover of the song:






Esperanza Spalding handles the song jazzily well, as well as in an individual fashion:






Trumpet master and vocalist Chet Baker takes a more traditional approach, but it's faultless:






And, of course, Bill Evans, as always, presents a classic take on this classic tune:






from Wikipedia:

Notable recordings

Bing Crosby - Like Someone in Love (1945)
Frank Sinatra - Songs for Young Lovers (1954)
Chet Baker - My Funny Valentine (1954)
Bud Powell - Jazz Original (1955)
Ella Fitzgerald - Like Someone in Love (1957)
Blossom Dearie - Give Him the Ooh-La-La (1957)
Ethel Azama - Cool Heat (1958)
John Coltrane - Lush Life (1958)
André Previn - Like Love (1960)[2]
Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers - Like Someone in Love (1960)
Eric Dolphy - At the Five Spot (1961)
Bill Evans - Time Remembered (1962)
Jack Jones - The Gift of Love (1962)
Barry Harris - Barry Harris/Tokyo: 1976 (1976)
The Dave Brubeck Quartet - Tritonis (1980)
Mike Stern - Standards (& Other Songs) (1992)
Björk - Debut (1993)
Django Bates - Quiet Nights (1997)
Sophie Milman - Make Someone Happy (2007)


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## TurnaboutVox (Sep 22, 2013)

Three favourites:

The Flying Lizards covering:
"Summertime Blues"





"Money (That's What I Want)" 





Siouxsie and the Banshees with Paul McCartney's "Helter Skelter"


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

The Balanescu Quartet covered Kraftwerk, a whole album full, on their classic release, Possessed. This is sort of like classical covers of rock music  It's a great album, by the way.











They even got David Byrne of the Talking Heads to sing one of the tracks for a special performance:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Alexander Hacke of the Einstürzende Neubauten has also done a fair amount of solo work. One of his earliest albums was of covers of western songs. The ambiance seems to have washed over this Nancy Sinatra cover:






Here's a cover of the Monks:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

John Cale covered Bauhaus' Rosegarden Funeral of Sores:






Brian Eno covered Bauhaus' Third Uncle on his legendary dadaist rock album, Taking Tiger Mountain (by Strategy):


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Bauhaus' cover of T. Rex' Telegram Sam:






Bauhaus' cover of David Bowie's Ziggy Stardust:


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Zeitkratzer covers Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music:











Live even! Wow! Sounds a lot better than Reed's original


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

Zeitkratzer cover Throbbing Gristle:






It is barely recognizable


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## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

The Beck we hear today is sadly awful: just mainstream hip hop and schmaltzy pop. I can't believe it's the same guy, but it seems to be true. However, Beck did some marvellous and original covers of two songs from of the Velvet Underground's first album that featured songs for Andy Warhol's multimedia events, the Exploding Plastic Inevitable.


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## Guest (Jul 25, 2014)

Hendrix covering Dylan's "Like a Rolling Stone" in 1967:






Deicide covering Deep Purple's "Black Night":


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