I’ve always thought cover versions of the original artists were a waste of time…
But why? There are countless songs out there covered by various people which are all as valid as one another. Listen to Tapestry, by Carole King, there are songs on there, like It Might As Well Rain Until September, which were hits for other people, but she wrote it, along with Gerry Goffin. Are you going to say her’s is a cover? Elvis Costello released an album called All This Useless Beauty, with a load of songs, like The Other End Of The Telescope, recorded by Aimee Mann, that Elvis actually co-wrote. Tori Amos and Shawn Colvin have made a point of covering other writers songs on their sets and as recordings, Shawn’s second album was all covers, it’s title, Cover Girl[/i], gives the game away, and she even covers Talking Heads’ Naiive Melody (This Must Be The Place). Live, she usually drops in at least one cover, last time I saw her it was Gnarls Barkley’s Crazy, and it was astonishing, the audience went wild after she sang it, with just an acoustic, showing just how good a song it really is. Tori has covered Led Zeppelin (Thank You), Jimi Hendrix, (If 6 Was 9), Billy Holliday, (Strange Fruit), Chas And Dave, (That’s What I Like), and I downloaded an Adele track performed by Linkin Park a couple of days ago. Back in the 60’s everyone did it, there was often three versions of the same song in the charts at the same time. A good song’s a good song, and a cover is really only invalid if it’s an exact, slavish copy of the original, where there’s little point in doing it. I’ve even got Faith No More covering Burt Baccarat, and it’s excellent. Check out Jeff Buckley’s cover of Laughing Len’s Hallelluja, and Lilac Wine, for more examples of how to do versions of great songs.
