come on people .................these so called artists today , a couple of songs in and you guessed it .their careers going down the bog , so they release a cover version, its sacrilige, some things are not meant to be re-cycled, especially songs

You do talk a load of rot! There is nothing wrong with a singer performing an old song - I refuse to call it a "cover". If these songs are not performed by the new up-coming singers, they will disappear which would be a tragedy.

The previous generations used to sing songs from everywhere. There was no problem about them singing someone else's song.

I am absolutely fed up with musical snobs.

If a band plays a cover live and if they bring something of their own to it (ie not a note for note cover) then that can be good fun. If a band have a cover as a B side then that can be good (Easyworld used to have a studio recorded cover on each of their singles, somewhere in the collection). Covers on charity records are good, because it is something a bit different from a band.

Covers where the artist brings something of their own to it as singles are acceptable, possibly. I think Scissor Sisters version of Comfortably Numb was good, but personally I wouldn't have done it as a single. But releasing a cover of a single as a direct copy, where a band brings nothing of their own to it, I think is completely pointless. It just shows that they need other peoples songs to make them any good.

jack

I agree with you Jack.

I love covers - there are some brilliant ones and it is inventive to hear music performed in different styles.

Two recent examples I have enjoyed:

Crazy in Love - Snow Patrol
Personal Jesus - Marilyn Manson

Covers of "pop" tracks by more serious bands like that are always good fun. Didn't Elbow do a cover of a Destiny's Child track a few years back for ** Whiley? Travis's cover of Baby One More Time for Mark And Lard was fantastic


I wrote a review of that for rawkstar.net which gave my thoughts on that... I'll paste the text here becuase it sums up what I think of it...

I've never really had much of an opinion of Marilyn Manson before now. However, this Depeche Mode cover seems completely pointless. It sounds exactly like the original, just with distorted guitars and a singer with a sore throat.

I don't mean to sound like I don't like the song. I love the original and I have found myself singing it to myself after hearing the cover on the radio, but it is just too much like the original. I'm not against people doing covers, but releasing them as singles, especially when the artist has brought nothing at all to the track, has little point in my eyes.

jack

Elbow also did a cover of Massive Attack's "Teardrop"

The nme/1Love album was full of covers in the same vein (McAlmont & Butler covering Take That's"Back for Good" and Jimmy Eat World covering Prodigy's"Firestarter")

Looks at playlist for more covers:
Bloodhound Gang :: Kim Wilde's Kids In America
Coldplay :: You Only Live Twice
The Darkness :: Radiohead's Street Spirit (Fade Out)
Jamelia :: Linkin' Park's Numb
Johnny Cash :: Hurt; One; Bridge Over Troubled Water
Keane :: U2's WIth Or Without You
Moby :: Radiohead's Creep
Oasis :: Neil Young's Hey Hey My My
Radiohead :: Carly Simon's Spy Who Loves Me
Razorlight :: Outkast's Hey Ya!
Ryan Adams :: Oasis's Wonderwall
Scissor Sisters :: Franz Ferdinand's Take Me Out
Snow Patrol :: Beyonce's Crazy In Love
Soulwax :: Nik Kershaw's Would It Be Good; Wham's Last Christmas; Prince's Starfish & Coffee
Starsailor :: S Club 7's Don't Stop Moving
The Vines :: Outkast's Ms Jackson
The Zuton's :: Scissor Sister's Take Your Mama

Jessica Simpson- Angels
Jessica Simpson- Take My Breath Away

Apparently Sony UK pulled the latter from UK single release after Robbie Williams asked them not to release "Angels" in Europe.

Jessica's credability as a good singer has sunk because of these 2 songs. She should not have re-issued 'In This Skin' with them on, as it was fine as it was. An example here of how doing covers is a BAD idea.

Depends- if an artists does a differant version that adds to the original then its fine - if they just try to do a copy then thats bad.

Looking forward to hearing the new "A Perfect Circle" cd which is an album of protest song covers.....heard a clip of John Lennons "Imagine" - very, very differant.

Also I love the Metallica "Garage Inc" covers CD - love their versions of "Whiskey in the Jar" and Blue Oyster Cults "Astronomy"

thats a bit harsh, i am not too sure that a song will "dissapear, if no one else covers it , it seems to me that the only songs that artists cover, are for the majority of them, tend to be classics anyway, i mean a fine example electric six (radio ga ga) and some bloke called dizzie rascal covering a cover of a song from south pacific, i rest my case

I wouldnt mind seeing covers banned. To be honest I like quite a few covers, but It would be good to see more artists come out with their own material.

Also Covering is different to Sampling eg The above poster in reference to Dizzee Rascal, another example: Jay Z - Hard Knock Life

I dont mind sampling, but covering a whole song is lazy, and although it might showcase an artists style, the covering artists hasnt put time into creating the music, its Kareoke.

I wish someone would ban Ronan Keating from recording crap cover versions!

Don't you mean "disappear"?

Talk about nitpicking!

In all fairness its a word which could easily be spelt wrong. Picking out spelling mistakes because you dont agree with issi noho's opinion, no offence, but thats really quite sad.

hotpantz is a good song. new ant no cover

Are you planning to post about this song on every thread on the forums?

well on the front page of digi spy there is an article about the top 20 cover versions. I think the top 10 is pretty accurate, what are your opinions?

Jeff Buckleys - Hallelujah is great

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds17320.html

I dont think covers should be banned.. *BUT* I dont think people should release them as singles.

i do apolagize apolegise,................ i am sorry

Consider this: The entire classical music industry would disappear overnight if covers were banned. So would the World's "best" (technically) singers. No more Three Tenors... Then again, looking on the bright side, no more Il Divo either!

Covers have their place alongside the new stuff - and they always will. Two examples of great covers from the pop world are Joe Cocker's "With a Little Help from my Friends" and Eva Cassidy's "Fields of Gold". Almost everyone thinks Eva's cover is waaaaay better than Sting's original, and many Beatles fans think Joe Cockers' cover is better than the original (though I think it's just different - and both versions are great).

Identical covers occasionally have their place, too. It may be a song that's considered impossible to cover because of the technical skills or vocal range needed to do it. If someone finally manages to pull it off successfully, they may get praised for being the only other singer good enough to cover it as its composer intended. In the classical music world, many people attach a lot of importance to doing things "as the composer intended".

There are plenty of other reasons for doing covers, too - so my answer to the original question is "no way, Jose!"

I don't think there's anything wrong with cover versions if the artist brings something new or original to their version of the track (Electric Six's Radio Ga Ga and The White Stripes I Don't Know What To Do With Myself are two recent examples I can think of). It's when they're total carbon copies of the original that there's a problem as that just brings music down to the level of karaoke. Liberty X's version of Got To Have Your Love, for example, which sounded IDENTICAL to the original - what's the point??

Ha ha ha! I was in a bit of a mood when I complained about your first post. Fed up with my husband not approving of me coming on the Internet!

I'm better now that I have seen Will Young in his absolutely fantastic concert at Wembley. Superb!

i think cover versions have there place in music, i really like the stereophonics version of handbags and gladrags (origionally by rod stewart).
also has any one heard eminems new song toy soldiers, as it samples the origional song Toy soldiers by Martika (sp?) which was released in the early 90's i think.

There is also a fantastic album called Urban Renewal, which has artists such as Lil Kim, Brian McKnight, Kelis, Brandy, Montell Jordan etc doing versions of the songs of Phil Collins, and it is brilliant, as they make the songs there own style

Just to continue the "Famous Covers" list:

"Singing in the Rain" was originally recorded in the 20s before Gene Kelly gave it the definitive work-over for the film of the same name.

"Hey Joe" was not composed by Jimi Hendrix, nor was "All Along the Watchower" (Dylan).

"Georgia on my Mind" was not written by Ray Charles, it's from the pens of Hoagy Carmichael and Stuary Gorrel.

Could go on and show off some other train-spotting skills. But I think you get the picture.


http://www.a-lyric.com

I think cover versions can be a good thing, there have been some excellent covers of songs in the past - Hendrix covering All Along The Watchtower, Jeff Buckley's version of Hallelujah, as well as some terrible ones like Britney's cover of Satisfaction. Unfortunately it seems that lots of artists today just cover songs because they are proven money makers or because they don't have anything else to sing, which is I think is completely the wrong approach.