The Smiley Smile Message Board

In General.....

1. Anybody but the inimitable David Ruffin singing "My Girl"......but esepicially some white guy trying to sing it....a justin timberlake type character comes to mind........

2. Anybody But Elvis Presley singing "Jailhouse Rock".......

3. Any Version at all (especially live versions) of "Be my Baby".......yea its a well written song......and yea, Ronnie's a great singer but.......I'd ditch her in a second, if you could just get a drummer that sounded like Hal......Yea, I know they're playing the same licks.......but it's boring......no one has the Hal Blaine feel.........Yup, I miss Hal's drumming alot more than I'd miss Ronnie Spector's voice........

and Specifically....

1. Elvis Presley covering Blue suede shoes........I really dislike that version...and it's the one they always play...It sounds tossed off....and I find Scotty Moore 's guitar licks to be distracting and dissonant......whereas IMHO, Carl Perkins' version is a lean , mean swinging machine....and it features that great sun production style......just real thick for a 4 piece band.....

2. Herman's Hermits cover of "Wonderful World".......Why does every oldies station always have to play this version.......I hate this version.......I hate it so much.........It just makes me wannna pistol whip the idiotic smiles off their faces.....Sam Cooke's version is so charming......

those are just a few......Ya'll have any covers to rant about?

I feel like this is the sort of thing I really ought to respond to...but I haven't thought it through. Beach Boys doing Buddy Holly was criminal, and I never liked Otis Redding doing "Satisfaction." Duke Ellington rearranging the Nutcracker Suite was great. Of Montreal doing VU's "She's My Best Friend" and Zombies' "Friends of Mine" makes me happy.

So...initial thoughts on some covers.

Debbie Harry's latine flavored cover of Strawberry Fields Forever is just... plain... awful.

I once heard an acoustic guitar-and-vocal duet of two women covering Snoop Dogg's "Gin and Juice." I heard it circa 1998 or '99. I haven't been able to find it since. But it was a fucking miracle. Just great, especially at the time, with that kind of music really still big. All of a sudden you hear two soft sopranos happily singing "I got bitches in the living room gettin' it on--they ain't leavin' till six in the morning." And it's a goshdarn cartoon, and you see how stupid some of the posing of all that sort of bravado was.

Favorite(s) - Johnny Cash - "I've Been Everywhere", "Rusty Cage", and "Hurt" - I love the sound of these records.

Non-Favorite - Guns N' Roses - "Knockin' On Heaven's Door" - Only Dylan can do this song justice; the pain...

Somewhere In The Middle -  Quiet Riot - "Cum On Feel The Noize" - I was glad it was a hit because it gave recognition to Slade, but pissed that it WASN'T Slade who had the hit with it (in the States of course).

Hmm I like some of the covers (for instance Jerry Lee did a GREAT piano based version of Jailhouse Rock), but yes post 70s Motown covers are pretty damn bad. Beach Boys related I remember a very bad version of In My Room played on the TV show Friends. The words bagain with "there's a room where I can go". Also thought the Beach Boys Friends should have been the theme but anyhow. I also hate when movies keep reusing the same songs. Great records like I Feel Good and Respect have been cheepened considerably by being leased all the time.

Anybody who does "Somewhere over the rainbow". It annoys me greatly when somebody auditions for American Idol and just absolutely rapes the song. Okay little princess, you're no Judy Garland, now leave and go back to waitressing at Hooters.

Rod Stewart's 1988 cover of Try A Little Tenderness. Possibly the worst vocal Rod has ever recorded...not only is it passionless (which isn't out of the ordinary for much of the material he's recorded in the past 30 years), but it's down-right offkey and amateurish.

Now covers I like...Mandy Moore's cover version of "Breaking Us in Two". The Joe Jackson original is a pretty nice song, but I love this recent (2003) cover. Her God Only Knows cover is pretty good, too.

Pretty much anything Bryan Ferry has ever covered.

Robert Palmer's cover of Mercy Mercy Me. Palmer actually sounded like Marvin Gaye on that...the man could fucking sing . Shame that he's pretty much only remembered for Addicted to Love, as that was one of his weaker songs...

I don't like his '56 version too, but he cut a version for '60s GI Blues that is top notch imo. Still I like Perkins' the most.


I'm not very keen on the Beatles' version of Buddy Holly's "Words of love" although McCartney changes the harmony voice a little which sounds nice, but on the whole it sounds just tired and boring. The original is awesome though.

Funny though I love the 56 BSS I also like the 1960 very much. Most people don't but I think Elvis' acoustic guitar playing on it is great.

The Beatles were pretty good at covers overall, I think the Stones were GREAT at covers.

I think that probably the worst cover ever is Jamie Cullum's "Everlasting Love". The Love Affair version is great, but I really hate that version.

Bothersome:
- That stupid remake of "Wild World", esp. the "one time...two times..." spoken thing
- Any of those Radio Disney remakes of pop classics
- every alt-rocker in the world doing a 40s classics album, and having to do a lopsided cover of "They Can't Take That Away From Me".  (Nothing against 40s classics, BTW;  I adore 'em.)
- Any live cover of "Moondance", "Mustang Sally", "What I Like About You"...etc.  I think you know what I mean here.
- Any live jazz-styled cover of a pop song where they totally bypass the feeling/meaning of the song in order to show off the chops of the singer or soloist
- Barbra Streisand's "Jingle Bells"--actually, this is sort of an example of the previous point.  Should be reserved for Guantanamo investigations.
- The Beach Boys doing "I Was Made to Love Her" and "Rock and Roll Music".  (Sorry, guys.)
- the weak remakes of "Don't Dream It's Over" and "There She Goes".  Why?  Why???
- ditto the previous poster's point about "Over the Rainbow".  Rape is not too strong a word here.  And once again, this echoes the Barbra/jazzy problem in a lot of ways.

Great:
- Jon Brion covering just about anything, particularly "Waterloo Sunset" and "Voices".  Go to Largo while you still can.
- Beatles, doing "Roll Over Beethoven" and "Long Tall Sally" at the Hollywood Bowl in '64
- Neil Young:  "Imagine".  I think there should be some sort of exclusivity contract deeming him the only one qualified to cover this.
- Elliott Smith: "Figure 8".  Making a TV cartoon song sound like something of his own.
- Elvis:  "Blue Moon".  There should be no other version.  Spooky, magnificent.  You can actually hear the moonlight on this.
- Madeleine Peyroux: "Between the Bars".  Billie sings Elliott.  I'm not sure I can handle the melancholy any more, though...
- The Jaguars: "The Way You Look Tonight"  Putting Beethoven over a swing song:  brilliant.  Puts all swing versions to shame.
- "I Only Have Eyes for You"- who was it?  The Moonglows maybe?  Once again:  makes the swing versions obsolete.
- Bangles:  "Hazy Shade of Winter" - I don't care what people say.  This is rockin'.


That's enough for now!

The Target commercial Hello Goodbuy

The diaper commercial All You Need is Luvs

And don't know if this counts but...

The nauseatingly overplayed sample of I'm Free used in the Chase Bank commercial. 

When the Revolution comes Target, Luvs & Chase Bank will be the first to go.

I think the best cover song ever done is "Painful" by Zoli Band. It's originally called "All In All" (I have no idea why they changed the titled) and was originally done by Dexys Midnight Runners. The original version was a drunken sounding waltz and Zoli Band turned it into a beautiful, soft 4/4 ballad. Really amazing.

A few more I like:

A couple by The Ramones - Surfin' Bird, California Sun, Do You Wanna Dance...

...and a couple by The New York Dolls - Pills, Don't You Start Me Talkin', Stranded In The Jungle

I hate Beatles covers, especially ones that try to change the sound entirely. So annoying. Another thing I don't like is covers of "Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polkadot Bikini" used for television commercials, because they only sing the first line of the chorus again and again and again. I can think of tons more but I'm tired so this is enough for now.

I think there are many covers out there who outdo the originals. Ray Charles' "Yesterday" or Elvis' 970 (not '73)-version of "Something". On the other hand there are probably more bad covers than goods, as those Beatles-songs are so famous.

Another thing that comes to my mind, I don't like those neo-Rockabilly groups, especially when they cover Carl Perkins' stuff.

Beatles songs are very tough to cover as they are so loved by the vast majority of the public that if you don't really bring something cool to the table, you will be hated for even trying!  There are SOOO many crappy versions of Beatles songs out there, but there are some cover versions of their tunes that are truly magical.  The above mentioned covers by Elvis and Ray Charles are great.  Also, I think Joe Cocker's versions of With A Little Help from My Friends and She Came In Throught the Bathroom Window are, dare I say it, better than the originals!!!   

Personally, I would much rather hear someone try to put a new spin on a tune than just rehash the original version.  What's the point in that when I can just put the original record on and listen to it? 

There has only been one Beatles cover I have ever heard that was better than the original...

Across the Universe by Fiona Apple... As far as the arrangement goes, I think it was prolly closer to what John had in mind than the Beatles version.

Bad covers are common.   Some are so bad they are hilarious.   The one that comes to mind is the late great Don Ho covering Fire and Rain.

I have some favorite covers including session man Geraint Watkins covering Heroes and Villains.  Brian Wilson meets Louis Prima.    You just have to hear it.

And the Mamas and Papas covering Dedicated to the One I Love.   That cover still moves me after all these years.

back to Somewhere Over the Rainbow...I highly enjoy Harry Nilsson's version & The Blank's (Ted's Band from Scrubs) versions....

and honestly, I don't really enjoy BW's This Could Be the Night compared to the original....

Be My Baby- Mike's version is terrible...

This has more to do with versions, but I enjoy Cilla Black's version of Alfie rather than Dionne's or Cher's

Ah yes. That terrible (TERRIBLE!!!!) duet from American Idol between Celinie Dion and Elvis... I wanted to poke my eyes out through my ears every time the camera cut from Elvis to her god-awful caterwauling on "If I Can Dream".

A great cover of a real classic song is Cathy Dennis'  version of 'Waterloo Sunset', somehow it's lovely!

Jan&Dean's "Yesterday" is awesome. Their arrangement is very close to the Beatles' but Dean's singing is so great and clear. Goes right into my heart....

Lenny Kravitz's rendition of American Woman is just horrific!

Agreed . . . that's Dean Torrence's best lead vocal.

M.

Jeff Tweedy from Wilco does a great cover of the Beatles' "Yesterday".

I like every single cover from The Beach Boys Party, especially the Beatles and Dylan ones.-Dennis does Hide Your Love Away Better Than Lennon (I'm probably going to be castrated for saying that)

The Apples In Stereo did a good cover of Heroes and Villains. Its only good, and not GREAT, because they took out the bicycle rider theme section, the my children were raised, sonny down snuff, and in the cantina sections. I will give them bonus points for throwing in the at three score and five section into their version.

The Olivia Tremor Control did a trippy cover of Do You Like Worms?

Brian Wilson covering Brian Wilson is pretty cool just because its Brian singing a song named after himself.

Barenaked Ladies do a kickass cover of George Michael's Careless Whisper. I've never heard the original, but I doubt its better than BNL's cover. The Ladies also cover When Doves Cry, Rio, and they used to cover Material Girl. They're good at taking cheesy 80s songs and making them a lot better than the original versions. Their cover of Material Girl always makes me laugh my ass off.

The Rolling Stones did an awesome cover of Dobie Gray's Free My Soul, a good 35 years before Uncle Cracker's cover came out.

I'll list some more if I can think of any...