John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

I'll Take You There

 

The original version by the Staple Singers remains one of my favourite recordings, ever, but I have to say I liked what Dave Wakeling and Ranking Roger did with a remake they made under the General Public umbrella for 1994's othewise forgettable collegiate rom-com Threesome. 

You're My Best Friend

Kudos to The Once for picking up three nominations for the East Coast Music Awards, including one for the video for their cover of You're My Best Friend, one of the hits bassist John Deacon wrote for Queen. Quite the nice cover, too. 

 

Knocking on Heaven's Door

A list of Bob Dylan covers would be a long, long one; here's one, by Anthony and the Johnsons, that's striking in a number of different ways. With Knocking on Heaven's Door, a few singers (Axl Rose comes to mind) bring out the macho in their versions of Dylan's western-inspired song about a dying gunslinger. Antony Hegarty goes in quite the opposite direction, pushing right to the edge where life and afterlife meet.

Let's Dance

M. Ward's excellent re-invention of David Bowie's monster hit is the song of the day. 

Here Comes The Sun (a la Nina Simone)

Yes, winter is still a long, long way from being over, but the sun is shining brilliantly in St. John's this morning and Nina Simone's cover of George Harrison's Here Comes the Sun played through on a random set from my laptop. There's randomness telling me something. 

Under Pressure, as performer by Rajaton in St. John's

Rajaton, the Finnish vocal ensemble, sang at Festival 500 last year in St. John's; one of the songs in their set was a cover of Queen and David Bowie's Under Pressure. CBC Radio 3 posted a video of the live performance here. 

Love Vigilantes

Not the New Order original, but a cover by Iron and Wine. 

Rich Girl (redux)

The Bird and the Bee (Inara George and Greg Kurstin) released a whole album of Hall & Oates covers last year, and it's not bad. The indie-pop treatment is given to Darryl Hall's kiss-off to a woman with more cash than manners. 

This Must Be The Place

The Talking Heads tune, one of our favourites, as covered by The Dead Leaves. (I thought it was The National. Go figure.)

This Must Be The Place - The Dead Leaves by danae-1

It's The End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)

Rapture this, dudes. It's Great Big Sea covering R.E.M.

Get a free tune

This one is too good for anyone to miss. John Legend recorded an a cappella cover of Adele's Rolling in the Deep, and has provided it for free download. Follow the links here. You're welcome!

Wishing, x 2

A confession. I played this song from A Flock of Seagulls' 1983 album Listen a good few times that summer. To the point, inevitably, that I couldn't listen to it anymore. I guess that happens sometimes.

The song was covers 20-odd years later by Nouvelle Vague, which scooped up songs from the new wave era and recast them with bossa nova-style interpretations.

I much prefer it to the original.

This is a cover of This Charming Man

Stars recorded a cover of this tune from The Smiths a decade or so ago. The video below is fan-made, with scenes clipped from Roberto Benigni's Life Is Beautiful.

Jimi Hendrix, and other Rolling Stone picks for best covers

Maybe it's covers week on Dot Dot Dot. Yesterday, I noted that Great Big Sea had made a list of best covers of R.E.M songs. Today, it's a list of best covers of all time, as compiled by Rolling Stone readers.

The list includes Jeff Buckley, Johnny Cash, the Beatles, NIrvana (x2, believe it or not), Muse and, of course, Jimi Hendrix reinventing Bob Dylan. Check out the list here.

Great Big Sea gets a nod in R.E.M. covers list

When I saw that Paste magazine has compiled a list of the best covers of R.E.M. songs, I thought to myself, "I sure hope they know about Great Big Sea."

Of course they do. The GBS cover of It's The End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine) is there, with a particular nod to the mandolin. It's a daunting song to cover, if only because of the speed-train of a beat and a truckload of complicated words.

You can sample the whole list here.

Here's the Great Big Sea cover:

Here's the R.E.M. original, from 1987:

Birthday party, cheesecake, jelly bean, boom.

Merry Clayton reinvents Gimme Shelter

I picked up a copy of February's edition of The Word - a finely produced music mag - and was taken by an article about cover versions that exceeded the originals. Subjective stuff, particularly as each entry came from a different writer.

The lead entry was one I didn't know until know even existed: Merry Clayton's cover of the Rolling Stones classic, Gimme Shelter. This sounded strange; after all, every music trivia buff knows that it was Clayton herself whose background vocals help define the song for the ages.

But, yep, Clayton recorded the song herself for a 1970 album that was named after the song that I would imagine was her calling card in the industry. And yes, when you hear her take on the lyrics - "Rape, murder, it's just a shot away," which are still pretty incendiary - you're inclined to agree that she more than held her own. Just listen.

The backing band includes Billy Preston, evidently. You can buy the whole album on iTunes.

Maybe Martin Scorsese would use this alternate version the next time he needs a transcendent tune for a violent sequence ... :)

In case you wanted to compare, here's the Stones tune, as it was released.

But.... THIS is where things get really interesting. Last year, the original tracks of Gimme Shelter made their way online, and it's something else to hear Jagger and Clayton laying down their vocals live together. Indeed, as mentioned in the Word article, you can actually hear Jagger's astonished reaction when she hits her crescendo. Take the video below to 2:46 and just listen!