Crank It Up To Eleven! : 11.04.08: I’ve Got You Covered

Posted by Sandeep Murali on 11.04.2008

This week, we focus on something that every band under the sun has done at least once in their career. No, the answer is not "Selling out".





Good morning/ afternoon/ evening as per your time zone and welcome back to the show where everyone's made up and the points don't matter. That's right, good music is the only criterion for entry to these parts, folks. It's been a booze filled weekend, my cranium is still numb and to add to the pain, my MS Office trial period ran out. Have I ever told you peeps how much NOT fun it is to work on MS works?

Well screw the money making machine coz I'm switching to Open Office, sucka! Hang on while I download my way to free word processing at a blistering 112 kB per second.

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Talk dirty to me:

...and 37 thumb twiddling minutes later, we're back in business.



Trashy says, "The best thing on all of the Hear 'N Aid record was the 200 seconds of live Motorhead.

I always hated that "who cries for the children" cheeseball opening and the solos didn't do a thing for me.

Maybe if they'd gotten the guys from Krokus it would have been better... but probably not.

And I still stand by Skid Row's "Slave" not suffering from being released 3 months before "Nevermind." Hell Skid Row spent almost 5 months in packed arenas nationwide that summer with G'NR. The problem is that they confused the casual fans of the first record with making a much harder record. While "Monkey Business" was a good first single, they shouldn't have gone with something as heavy as the title track for the follow up which seemed to scare off a lot of their female core audience. Atlantic put a ton of stock into that record and pushed it to the moon. The flat sales can't be blamed on the onslaught of Nirvana a few months later. Besides it also took some time nationally for that Nirvana record to really take off. It didn't debut at #1 on Billboard like Skid Row did that June. "


Well sir, you do have a point when you say that "Slave to the grind" ended up confusing the core (female) audience. But sometimes a band's gotta do what a band's gotta do, right? If that was the direction they wanted their music to evolve into, then they have all my respect for doing the right thing. Ironic, considering the fact that their post-Bach efforts were half assed attempts at conforming to the flavor of the month.

As for "Hear 'n Aid", like I said, It's an extremely polarizing record!




Bouquets, brickbats, whatever you got; throw ‘em this way. It's all good.

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I Remember You... And your music:

Well, this week, we're doing things a bit differently. Instead of focusing on one particular artist, we're gonna talk about a Specific song style. Namely, Cover Songs. Pretty much every band in the history of music has "Covered" a song originally performed by another artist. But why exactly do they do this? Well the answer is, there is no singular answer. Bands do it for a variety of reasons, sometimes a combination of a few of them. Let's take a closer look, shall we?

1) Paying respect:

This is the most common reason why bands perform cover songs. Every band worth their name grew up listening to other bands. Every musician out there has someone to thank for developing their music style. And doing a cover is perhaps the best way to say "Thank you for the music, for giving it to me". Pun unintended.

But there is a corollary to this. Chances are that the bands target audience are oblivious to music from a previous era. Tribute cover songs are the band's attempts at introducing their fans to their roots. And help them garner some much needed attention in the process. For example, I'll be candid enough to state that I'd have never discovered Diamond Head if it wasn't for Metallica's cover of "Am I evil?". Plus, the former band has officially stated that the royalties they receive from the cover have helped them significantly, which is always a good thing. Say what you will of Mr. Ulrich, but the man sure is more thankful to his roots than the average human being is:



The original




The cover. With a twist


Speaking of adding a twist;

2) Evolving the original formula:

A great musician always adds a personal touch to everything he works upon. More often than not, this means that their music style significantly differs from what they grew up listening to. Chances are, the best of 'em may even be technically superior to the artists who provided them inspiration in the first place. It is only fair that they take a brilliant template of a song and make it their own. Misguided souls may end up arguing which is better, but to me, such an argument does not hold water. The cover would not have been possible without the original and that's the end of it. Enjoy them both for what they are and you'll be a happy music fan.



The original




The cover


I'd rate Randy Rhoads' performance on the guitar higher than Mustaine's in their respective renditions of "Paranoid", but with Ozzy singing, it's not really a Cover, is it?

3) Proving oneself:

Over the years, there have been several bands that were unfortunately stereotyped into something that they really weren't. (Incidentally, I had touched upon this in my First column here at 411). One of the best shots they have at proving the critics who call them "Blackholes of talent" and such wrong is to cover a difficult song from a legendary band. More so if they get a favorable appraisal from the original band. Like this one for instance:



The original




The Cover


I've heard reports that Great White barely had any time to practice before that performance, which it makes even more amazing.

4) A complete re-interpretation

Sometimes, performers pick original songs from another genre and give it a complete makeover in accordance to the style of music they practice. Usually, everything but the lyrics are drastically different from the original. Sometimes to a point where it can't really be called a cover anymore. The dangerous thing about this type of a cover is that the performance can easily fall flat on its face, making the audience beg for mercy. Like this train wreck, for example:





***Shudder***



On the other hand, the right amount of creativity, inspiration from a variety of sources and some good ol' charisma can end up in one motha of a guilty pleasure. You know, a cover that you are supposed to hate but you just... can't?





If it's good 'nuff for David Gilmour, it's more than good 'nuff for me.


...and lastly,

5) Riding the coattails

What do you do if you're a band that has barely anything creative to show off? Why, rape a timeless classic in the guise of a tribute of course! It may turn out that there are parts of the song (like a solo for instance) beyond your skill set, but fear not; let's get a competent guitarist to fill that part in in the studios. (Never mind the fact that the band has two full time "guitarists". If it ain't power chords, we ain't playin' it). But then what about live shows? Bah, let's skip that part altogether. Solo-shmolo my ass.

Oh, you know what I'm getting at:




And for that gem, "Fall out boy" earns my weekly "Die in a fire".




Now for something different:

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I can't give a fuck if you won't let me to.

You know, I usually don't give two hoots about music/ musicians outside the rock/ metal spectrum. Much less about some reality show semi-finalist who sounds like, erm... pretty much everything else on TV. But when major news sources reported the murder of One Jennifer Hudson's family, I was truly shocked. Losing one's family members is indeed a serious issue and my thoughts went out to the poor girl.

Until this:

"Jennifer Hudson has started a foundation in honor of her family members who were shot dead last week. The specific purpose of the Foundation is to care for the needs of families who have lost relatives to a violent crime. This encompasses their basic needs of food, clothing and shelter as well as grief counseling ".


Bitch please.

It's only been a few DAYS since your family met with this horrible tragedy. You know what you can actually do in their honor? Shutting the fuck up and mourning. That's what. No, don't even pretend like this is some kind of other worldy humanitarian gesture. It isn't. You know it, I know it, and everybody with half a dozen brain cells to spare knows it.Words cannot describe how much I am turned off by this pathetic, deplorable attempt at publicity.


You just lost major points in the sympathy and care department, sister.

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Never say goodbye:

I was never a big Queen fan. The band has always been a hit or miss case for me. They came up with some awe inspiring works of art such as "Bohemian Rhapsody" and on the other hand, truly WTF-worthy, er... things such as "Radio Ga Ga". That said, there was no denying the fact that Freddie Mercury was one hell of a performer and perhaps, is the best front man of all time. So what would a Queen album be like, post Mercury? With this question in mind, I gave "The Cosmos Rocks" a spin.

Let's get one thing straight. Rodgers is no Mercury. Mr. Bad Company isn't even close. But what he does do successfully is play a supporting role to the master, Brian May. For the first time, May is not overshadowed by an avalanche of charisma that was Mercury. And that's a good thing. For the record is choc-a-full of amazing, bluesy guitar work. Get this record for that factor alone. It's truly worth it.



Rock on and see y'all next Tuesday.