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Cover Versions

Meg Baird – All I Ever Wanted

The New Riders of the Purple Sage released the original on their wonderful self-titled debut album (Columbia, 1971).
Espers vocalist Meg Baird recorded her cover on her first solo album "Dear Companion" (Drag City, 2007).

 
The Johnny Burnette Trio – The Train Kept A-Rollin'

The original version was released by Tiny Bradshaw on the King label in 1952. Red Prysock played tenor sax on this session.
The Johnny Burnette Trio's rockabilly cover of the song with the wonderfully distorted guitar sound was released on Coral in late 1956. The fabulous Grady Martin on the rocking guitar.

"I caught a train, I met a dame, she was a hipster and a real gone dame
She was pretty, from New York City, and we trucked on down the old fair lane
With a heave and a ho, well, I just couldn't let her go"

 
Mullardman said:
I refuse to acknowledge most of these as 'covers'. They are simply 'versions'. Love For Sale for e.g. is a 'standard'. It was written by Cole Porter in 1930. It has been recorded by numerous people since,( Ella Fitzgerald, Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Anita o'Day, Billie Holiday, etc., etc., so whose version is Costello supposed to be 'covering'? Answer. Nobody's. He is simply doing his own (and in my personal opinion not great) version.

A cover version is very specifically a recorded version of a current or very recent hit,by a different artist/band in order to 'cash in ' on its popularity. Read, for e.g., any number of concurrent versions of American hits by UK artists in the 1960s.

Following the logic of the current and IMHO, wrong/illogical usage of the term 'cover' to its logical conclusion, it is only a matter of time before we start hearing "Have you heard the LSO's cover of Beethoven's 5th?" It's ludicrous.

I understand that the useage of the term 'cover version' has changed. But it's still wrong.
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He’s off on one again...
 
No idea what you refer to with “6 months ago”.

It is your regular and recent outrage at relative trivia to which I referred.

What you wrote about covers is tosh.
 
‘The Moog Cookbook Plays the Classic Rock Hits’ is certainly the funniest set of cover versions I know. ‘Whole Lotta Love’ makes me laugh out loud.
 
stefane said:
The Walkabouts - Cello Song

Wonderful Nick Drake song from his debut album "Five Leaves Left".

The cover is by the Seattle band The Walkabouts.
It was included on the Nick Drake tribute "Brittle Days - A Tribute to Nick Drake", released on Imaginary Records in 1992.

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Sorry to disagree but Nick Drake should be off limits as far as covers are concerned. The originals are just perfect, as confirmed by Joe Boyd.
 
Sun and the Rainfall - Marsheaux. Original was by Depeche Mode in their album A Broken Frame.

I view the Marsheaux version as a cover version.

They also did a wacky version of Empire State Human by The Human League...
 
Seven Bridges Road - a song written by Steve Young by performed to perfection by Ian Matthews on Valley Hi. Matthews version, produced by Mike Nesmith, is so good that it was effectively copied by The Eagles and, apparently, used by them as an acapella warm up before they performed.

 
I’ll chip in with ‘you’re the one that I want’ by Lo-Fang.
A song that is of no relevance to me, but a creative interpretation.
 
Bob McC said:
No idea what you refer to with “6 months ago”.

It is your regular and recent outrage at relative trivia to which I referred.

What you wrote about covers is tosh.
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You supported your contention by quoting a 6 month old post by me.

WTF you mean by 'regular and recent' is beyond me.

My opinion on covers is not tosh. I repeat. Are numerous versions of the established classical repertoire 'covers'? ..either of the orginal composition or of an earlier version?

There is only one sensible definition of a cover. And I've already covered it.
 
Cover versions should be related to songs with vocals. Instrumentals don't count IMHO.

Miles Davis didn't really "cover", for example, Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" which was his main feature tune in every gig since 1985 and until his death.

A proper cover version is a re-interpretation that takes the song into places the original (or a previous cover) didn't go. The best surpass the original - for example:

Aretha's version of Otis' "RESPECT" puts a different slant on it and is arguably rightly better known

Jimi's version of "All Along The Watchtower" changed it entirely, and even Dylan admitted bettered his own
 
Engels said:
Cover versions should be related to songs with vocals. Instrumentals don't count IMHO.

Miles Davis didn't really "cover", for example, Cyndi Lauper's "Time After Time" which was his main feature tune in every gig since 1985 and until his death.
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Disagree entirely about instrumentals. Any original recording , or even any composition, can be treated differently by subsequent performers and in subsequent versions. AIUI, a lot of what 'classical' music is about, is different performers and/or conductors, putting their own interpretation on classical compositions, and with ensuing argument/discussion as to the merits, or otherwise, thereof. At no point that I've observed does talk of, for e.g. Lloyd Webber's 'cover' of Jaqueline Du Pre's Elgar Cello ever occur. All performances/recordings are seen as 'versions'.. in their own right.

I'd agree that Miles Davis didn't 'cover' 'Time After Time', because he wasn't attempting to emulate the original in order to cash in on its chart success. Just playing his version of the melody.. some time after its initial chart success, and minus the vocal, as jazz musicians have done since the beginning.

A proper cover version is a re-interpretation that takes the song into places the original (or a previous cover) didn't go. The best surpass the original - for example:

Aretha's version of Otis' "RESPECT" puts a different slant on it and is arguably rightly better known

Jimi's version of "All Along The Watchtower" changed it entirely, and even Dylan admitted bettered his own
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I disagree that the word cover is necessary, or even applicable to the examples you quote, and I vehemently disagree with the idea that a 'cover' is a 'reinterpretation etc...' A genuine cover is the direct opposite and is an attempt to emulate the original, at the time it is in the charts. in order to 'cash in' on the original's success. I've quoted many examples of this tactic before. It was commonplace from the 1930s (at least) in the UK, where for e.g. Joe Loss sold many copies of his cover of Miller's 'In The Mood', right up until the 1960s. And that really was a 'cover'. An attempt at a 'note for note' copy.

There were even 'covers' labels back in the 1960s, such as 'Embassy', sold by Woolworth.. offering cut price versions of current hits, and those awful LPs of cheap covers with a picture of a scantily clad girl on the front, which continued to be sold up to at least the 1980s.





http://darren-blog.blogspot.com/2007/02/phwoar-it-of-pops.html



There existed numerous local 'groups', 'rock bands' or whatever you want to call them, whose main output was 'copying' the popular songs of the day. The Beatles started out doing this, even playing Shadow's instrumentals, just as did many other bands. Yet nobody called them 'covers bands', because the accepted meaning of a 'cover', was applied exclusively to 'cover' recordings.

I accept that the popular useage of the term 'cover' has changed, and that bands who copy hit songs are now generally called 'covers' bands, but this doesn't make it a correct use of the term. In fact it is rather silly, because we are now forced into trying to decide whether a recording of a previously known song is a 'cover', a 'version', or a 'cover version' And of course if you accept that any version of a known song is a 'cover', then the term 'cover version', actually means 'version version'. :rolleyes:

It's all got very silly. Stick with this. A copy, at the same time as the original hit, is a cover. Any other version, is a version.
 
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Alex Chilton – Nobody's Fool

Alex Chilton - best known for his times in the Box Tops and Big Star - covered this Dan Penn song on his album "High Priest", released in 1987 on Big Time Records.
Dan Penn's original was the title track of his 1973 solo debut album.

 
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