6 cover songs that you can't live without.

I get asked by a lot of you people to do a top song list, or a favorite band list, or a worst "this" or a best "that" and it can't really be done. Check that. It can be done, but it has to broken down into minute categories.
For example, I could list what my favorite band but that's fucking useless, because you there are no qualifiers. You can't qualify music, but you can quantify it if you put it into sections. And you really can't even do that, you have to put it into basic sections. Like, what is the best CD to listen to on a road trip(probably would be something like "Come on and Feel the Lemonheads", or "Jimmy Eat World", or maybe "Full Moon Fever" or anything by Our Lady Peace).
Or what is the best soundtrack song of all time? (Mallrats!)
Or best Billy Joel song? (The Downeaster Alexa) And even though I just made up a catagory, its not even that simple. It all depends on your mood. Is this roadtrip to go see a long lost love? Is it a roadtrip with beer drinking buddies to Vegas? It this roadtrip a mini vision quest in which you want to find yourself? If so, I recommend something very lyrical, like Pink Floyd's "High Hopes" over and over again.

See what I mean? There has to be sub-categories. You can't have a general conversation about art without qualifying it.

So a couple months ago I got an email from a buddy of mine and the conversation turned to what was the greatest Cover songs of all time? A couple popped into my head, like, Cake's version of "I Will Survive", or "Move it on Over" by George Thoroghgood, or "Signs" by Tesla..... There are literally thousands and thousands of them. If you really think about it, you could probably come up with about 20 off the top of your head. Some are awesome and some are fucking horrific.
Have you ever heard Dolly Parton's version of "Stairway to Heaven?" I'm not going to even link it for fear of the linking police giving me a beat down. I tried listening to it one time, but could only make it through about 4 seconds. Stupid whore. You can't redo Robert Plant. That's an actual rule at Juliard I think.
What about "Sweet Child O' Mine" re-done by Sheryl Crow? Ugghh. Who told her that her version was good? Mary Matlin? Remember that scene in Dumb and Dumber where Lloyd asks the hitman if he's heard the most annoying sound in the world? Sheryl Crow's version of this GNR song is a close second to that noise.
Obviously, there are a lot of bad versions, but there are some ones that are perceived as good that I don't agree with. "Hurt" by Johnny Cash is one of them. I think it sucks, and the Nine Inch Nails version is a million times better. Of course it seems that everyone in the free world disagrees with me, but everyone else in the world is rarely right. C'mon! People in large groups are stupid, and the thousands of people that think that Cash's version is better than the original are fucking delusional. It isn't and I say that being a huge J.C. fan, much more so than Trent Reznor. I only have 5 songs that I like by NIN and there are about 9 that I like by Cash. "Hurt" is not one of them. (I am, most certainly, fucking wrong.)
I also think that the Limp Biscuit version of The Who's "Behind Blue Eyes" is pretty good. Not Great, but good. Everyone in the free world also disagrees with me on this one as well. I personally believe that most people have such a hatred for Fred Durst and Limp Biscuit that it clouds their judgment on this particular song, and let's be honest, Fred Durst makes it pretty hard to like him. He's a fucking twat.

But before we begin, there are some guidelines.
1. The remade song cannot be identical to the original. It has to be re-made, not re-done. IE, Smashing Pumpkins version of "Landslide". What's the point of a successful artist re-making a song if it is identical to the fucking original? There is no point, they just want to sell more records, that's all. Capitalism at its worst. Fucking Jews.
2. You have to know that the song is a remake, rather than thinking it is the original version. Example. I thought that "Babe I'm gonna leave you" was an original Led Zeppelin song. It isn't. It's originally a Joan Baez song, and while I'm pretty sure that the Led Zeppelin version kicks Baez's version in the cooter, I cannot be certain of it, so it would be wrong of me to say that it is the better version of the two. So this specific song is not allowed in this contest. Get it? Good.

I have a list of 15 remade songs that qualify for the above guidelines, but I ended up narrowing it down to just 9. Some of them are fairly obvious, for example "Mr Tambourine Man" by The Byrds is fucking awesome, but it just didn't make it. Of course this song was originally a Bob Dylan song, and if you remake any fucking Bob Dylan song it makes it better. A cat in heat that is getting fucked with a chainsaw singing "Mr Tambourine Man" would be better than Bob Dylan singing it. I'm convinced that Bob Dylan was a musical LSD experiment that went awry in the 60's. I'm not saying that his lyrics are bad, I'm just saying that he should have followed Kris Kristofferson's lead and wrote the song down for someone else to sing. Don't believe me?
There are some other notables such as "Its my Life" by No Doubt. This song was originally done by a band in the 80's called Talk Talk, and it isn't unlikeable, but No Doubt fucking destroy Talk Talk's version. It's like watching a tiger fight a gazelle with a broken leg.
"Come on Eileen" also makes the list. No, Dexy and his Midnight Runners didn't remake it. I'm talking about a band called Save Ferris. They re-did it, and they kill it. Its got an awesome brass part in it, and its faster, and of course there isn't some gay dude in overalls dancing in the video on some street corner. If Dexy's wanted to make the video better they would have riverdanced to it.

So here is my top 6 from 6th to 1st.


6. Once Bitten Twice Shy
Originally done by Ian Hunter, and remade by Great White. Yes, the same Great White that killed about 100 people in Connecticut (was it Rhode Island?) a few years back. I'm betting that a lot of you didn't know it was a remake, well, it is. I'm not smarter than you, I just have friends that are. (maybe not smarter, just weirder) I have a friend who's favorite artist right behind The Beatles is Ian Hunter. Specifically when Ian Hunter was in the band Mott the Hoople. This buddy of mine talked me into going to an Ian Hunter show about 5 years ago and I fucking hated it. In fact I left early, which is should tell you a lot about it because I love live music. Any live music. But not that night. Ian Hunter sucks. He only wrote one good song, which is this, and and performed another one that was written by David Bowie"All the Young Dudes" which just became somewhat popular again because it is on the "Juno" soundtrack.
Plus who names the band Mott the Hoople? What the fuck is a Mott? Apple Sauce? I looked it up, and it isn't even worth remembering.
ANYWAY.
This version by Great White is great. Especially the face melting guitar solo three minutes in. That solo makes me feel like I am listening to "Freebird" all over again. If you don't like this song, or Freebird then there is something clinically wrong with you.






5. Whisky in a Jar
Originally done by The Dubliners, but everyone on the fucking planet has tried to make this song better. Metallica succeeded. When I listen to this song it makes me want to punch holes in walls. Or car windows. Which is weird because if you listen to the words, they don't really make any fucking sense. I don't even know what the song is about. I think its about drinking, because you know, the word "whisky" is in title. Which makes sense, because it was made by some fucking Irish band.
Check that.
I just looked up the lyrics and its about some dude that robs another dude, takes all of his money and brings it home to his woman "Molly", and ends up in jail. RE-Tarded. I wish I wouldn't have looked it up, because singing about liqueur is cool enough. That's why Mr Brownstone is such a great song. (in retrospect that song might be about heroin?)






4. Higher Ground
Originally done by that beautiful blind black motherfucker. Stevie Wonder. His version is easy on the ears, but I distinctly remember buying the CD "Out in LA" by The Red How Chili Peppers in High School and listening to "Higher Ground" and being blown away by it. Just like the other covers that are great, the Chili's fucking destroy the original version. But I could be wrong, there's a song on the same album aptly titled "Fuck You" in which they don't really sing, but just say "fuck you" during the whole thing. I can remember being enamored with that song as well. Of course the Chili's are also in a different bucket which is of course the same bucket that Aerosmith is in. The "you guys should start doing drugs again because since you quit your fucking music sucks" bucket. I'm not going to go into a long diatribe about their music nowadays, because I don't need to. We all know they were better when the band was fucked out of they're minds on heroin and coke. Their goal is to live long enough to enjoy the fruits of their labors, we just want them to make good music again. Who cares if they die in the process? Yeah, we get it. Stupid artists. Of course one of their original members did. Hillel Slovak in 1988, but I never knew him. I only know that when John Frusciante was fucked up and rocking the guitar they were awesome.





3. Smooth Criminal
Everyone on the planet knows that Michael Jackson originally made this song, but a little known group called Alien Ant Farm did the re-make, and it sounds a cajillion times better than the original. The song makes no sense as its about a girl named "Annie" that is attacked in her apartment by some faceless hitman. It was pretty popular when it was released in '87, but as we all know, people had stupid and retarded musical tastes in 1987. Example, in 1987 the top 5 songs were:
1. "Faith".....George Michael
2. "Alone".....Heart
3. "I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)" .....Whitney Houston
4. "C'est la Vie".....Robbie Nevil
5. "Shake You Down".....Gregory Abbott

I have never heard of songs 2, 4, and 5. That's how bad of a year it was. Of course I was 6 years old though, and my favorite song was "Christmas Time", by Alvin and the Chipmunks.
The band Alien Ant Farm re-made the song, sped it up snd added a temple pounding guitar to the mix. Which as we all know, makes everything better. Fact. Alien Ant Farm did however pay homage to Mr. Pederass by mimicking him in the music video that they did for the song, when they lean over in unison just like Sir Whiteness did in his stage routine in concert. Which is gay. So they could have just left that part out. The song hit number one on the "Modern Rock Board" in the U.S. and also hit numero uno in Australia. Which makes me reconsider my ranking of 3rd best cover song of all time.





2. Hey Ya
If you didn't hear the song "Hey Ya" in 2003 you were either in a coma or dead. It topped most of the music charts in 2003, and was not only a popular success it was a critical success as well. The song won the group a Grammy in 2003 as well. Most rock/rap/pop critics were pleased with the song, and to this day I have no idea why? Yes, its catchy. But its one of those weird songs that you both don't understand why its good, but completely understand why it was a hit. Its easy to compare it to other popular songs nowadays simply because you never question why everyone likes it, but you, yourself, didn't like it. Then as you are driving down the road you catch yourself singing the lyrics, and you didn't even know that you knew them. Its the same with Justin Timberlake's song "I'm Bringing Sexy Back". The song isn't good, in fact its bad, but it has a catchy beat, and the chorus is the main part of the song, and it is really basic and easy to remember. Hey Ya, is the same. Hey Ya is also in another category that most music isn't in, its in the category of being so big it takes on a life of its own. "Hey Ya" spurned commercialism. Because of its success it gave new life to a publically traded company, Polaroid. Yes, you read that right. In the song "Hey Ya" there is a catchy lyric that we all know "shake it like a Polaroid picture". This specific line in the lyrics helped Polaroid sell more camera's. This of course doesn't happen very often in pop culture, but it happened with this hit. (Another great example is with the movie "Office Space". Office Space was so popular that there was a whole new niche market that opened up. Red Staplers. Before the movie "Office Space" the company Swingline had never manufactured red staplers, now they are one of their top selling color of stapler)
Because of the songs popularity and hence the new found success of the Polaroid company, Polaroid decided to just run with the motherfucker and sponsored Outkast parties in which they handed out cameras at every fucking event. Jesus.
Then all of a sudden 3 years after the song was a massive fucking hit, some dude named Matt Weddle stepped up during an open mic night at a bar and re-made the song. Right now as I am typing this list Matt Weddle's version has been watched over 2.8 million times on Youtube, (Minus the hundred or so times I've watched it) and countless other times on other web supported video browsers on the tri-dubs. I have yet to find anyone that doesn't think that Matt's version is better than the original, which is weird. Not weird because they're wrong, it's weird because of the success of the original song. I cannot think of another song that someone re-made that was better than the original,,,,,,,that was as popular as "Hey Ya" Not one. And that is what makes Matt Weddle's version so fucking awesome. He re-made a song that was the most popular song in the world in 2003, and made it better. And he was a nobody. Pretty fucking cool. You would think that Matt and his band Obadiah Parker would have ridden the wave of his infamous success on the internets to glory, but no one knows where he and his band went. Probably back under the rock from whence they came.





1. The Metro
Originally done by Berlin. Yes, the band that was on the "Top Gun" soundtrack and sang "Take My Breath Away". That Berlin. Berlin strikes me as a band that is screaming for all of their songs to be re-made, they were just that middle of the road. Nothing they did was great, and nothing they did was that bad. They were the Buffalo Bills of music. 9 bands have re-made the song "The Metro", including "System of a Down" and while I haven't heard the other versions, this one is easily the best re-make of any song of all time. Other than the words, nothing is the same as the original, and its goddamn perfect. The story goes that System of a Down re-made the song and two other tracks and while playing the Whisky in L.A. and caught the eye of record producer Rick Rubin, which eventually led to them being signed by American/Columbia records. I was a big fan of System of a Down, (and still am) but had never heard "The Metro" until 2005. They had gotten popular in 2001 with hits "Chop Suey" and "Aerials", but still no one had heard of "The Metro" until later on. I was blown away the first time I heard it in 2005, and can remember where I was. I was with my buddies at "The Leprechaun" and someone had played it on the jukebox. From that point on, I never put a dollar in that same jukebox without keying up this selection. Sadly,within a day of me playing it, everyone was annoyed with me because of my inability to not air guitar to it, but that's a whole other rant.