Long Overdue Cover Day!

Harvey Girls - Burning For You (Blue Oyster Cult cover)
After my last post on the Harvey Girls I delved even deeper into their stuff, including this slinky and sexy cover of one of the ultimate mullet rock songs of all time. Verses are scaled back to mainly organ and beats with some flourishes on guitar. The main riff sounds like it was stripped from the kind of movie you aren't supposed to admit that you've ever seen. All I can say is...wow.


Volebeats - Maggot Brain (Funkadelic cover)
Here I go again posting another band that I know nothing about. Best as I can tell, this group of guys play a fairly standard version of alt country, but you give them the song that was once called "the hardest song of all time", and they turn into funky guitar heroes. If there was ever a song that is deserving of a spot on "Guitar Hero III", its gotta be Maggot Brain.


Flaming Lips with Cat Power - War Pigs (Black Sabbath cover)
I get asked about this cover all the time so here you go. Wayne is no match for early Ozzy, but man, the band sounds great. And the looks on Chan's face are great. If you get a chance to catch this on a re-run on PBS or something it's worth watching.


Toad the Wet Sprocket - Hey Bulldog (Beatles cover)
Somehow Toad's name has gotten mired down to a reference to the run of the mill earlt-to-mid-90's boring rock, but it really isn't true. Toad shows off a bit more of their rambunctious rockin' side with this track showing off what made their music so compelling.


Rufus Wainwright with Kate McGarrigle - I Eat Dinner (Live on KCRW) (Kate and Anna McGarrigle cover)
This is a particularly interesting cover because here you have one of the songwriters paired up with her son while giving the story behind the song. The imagery in the song, as Kate mentions, is quite strong. I've never heard the original, but I can't imagine it's much better than this. And the mother-son pre-song banter cracks me up. "Mummy! Bridge."


Ray Charles - Wichita Lineman (Jimmy Webb cover)
Ahh...my favorite country song. And then you add Ray's strong voice, shimmering strings and one wicked bass line...and I think I'm in love.


Kings of Convenience - Gatekeeper (Feist cover)
After Feist appeared on several KoC tracks, it seems only right that they swank on down with a Feist cover. The "June July August" harmonies are spot on and quite lovely...much like Feist herself.


Madeline Peyroux - I Wish I Could Shimmy Like My Sister Kate (Ummm...a cover)
Ah...a playful ode to being jealous of a slutty sister.




And by the way, I have a last.fm account now, so feel free to stop by and befriend me. If you're into that sort of thing...