[Closed] Your favourite covers

usually most covers ruin a good song... the exceptions that come to mind for me are:
GNR - live and let die
Foo Fighters (well Grohl) - Band on the Run

weird that the two are mcartney songs. hey ho.

Johnny Cash's Hurt is better than NIN's,

The American Recordings are full of tracks better than the original.

GNR Live and Let Die, and Johnny Cash's Hurt are on my list as well.

ZZ Top's take on Jailhouse Rock is pretty darned good, too.

Behind Blue Eyes is the gold standard Shit Cover isn't it. OTOH their Faith was ace to leap around too.

I love Frank Turner's version of The District Sleeps Tonight (can't stand the original!), and Therapy? doing Isolation, but generally I prefer the off-the-wall ones. China Drum's version of Wuthering Heights, or the Apples doing Killing In The Name... Some are genius, some are funny.

Darius doing 'Hit Me Baby One More Time'.......... (Was going to put Darius doing Britney Spears but it did not sound right!).

ZZ Top's take on Jailhouse Rock is pretty darned good, too.

Speaking of which, ZZ Top's Tramp from Mescalero is better even that Otis' original IMO.

Thea Gilmore covering Sweet Child of Mine

and this is inspired..

This comes to mind...

GNR - live and let die

Good shout, that.

Also liked the Lemonheads' [i]Mrs Robinson[/i].

Anything by The Shire Horses is on the list to start with

Living Colour have done some good ones - Should I Stay Or Should I go, Memories Can't Wait among them

Propellerheads version of On Her Majesy's Secret Service

Tricky cover of Black Steel by Public Enemy

Quite like this too...

I like the original, but think the cover is better.

Covers? Easy. Anything by Me First and the Gimme Gimmes:

😆 😆 😆

I quite like Muse's Feelin Good and as above GNR's Live & Let Die and Johnny Cash's Hurt are good. Can't see all the youtube vids as they are blocked at work.

And another...

GNR LnLD is my favourite but these are close:

Hard to Handle - Black Crowes (which I saw them playing superbly last night)

Remember tomorrow - Metallica

Love Potion No. 9 - The Coasters

Light my Fire - Shirley Bassey (yes, it's great!)

Sunshine of Your Love - Jimi Hendrix

It's my Life - Paul Anka (from the superb cover album "Rock Swings")

And I second the Living Colour shout they did some great covers.

Chili Peppers - Higher Ground
UK Subs - She's Not There
Jimi Hendrix - All Along the Watchtower
Anything by The Dickies,esp Silent Night & Eve of Destruction

The whole of Thea Gilmore's re-recording of 'John Wesley Harding' is an improvement on the original.

Also Paul Anka's take on 'Smells like Teen Spirit'. Amazing version.

You're all completely wrong about GnR's 'Live & Let Die' though, it's cuffin' awful. However their version of 'Down on the Farm' is great.

And how can we not have any Richard Cheese in this list already ffs?

CAUTION - some NSFW lyrical content 😆

Just for Johnny's moaning 🙂

I wouldn't say it's better than T Rex, but I loved Bauhaus, so loved their cover

Gonna have to think of something less than 30 years old!

Saw her play in Malta in December. She's the real deal. Skills on the guitar too.

Here's one... (shame the video is a bit boring 😉 )

This:

or

or

The Damneds version of Help by the Beatles

Rage Against the Machine Renegades

Recorded:
The Slits - Marvin Gaye's 'Heard it Through the Grapevine'
The Band -Little Richard's 'Slippin' and Slidin''
Dakar and Grinser - The Stooges' 'I Wanna be your Dog'

Live:
Mercury Rev -Peter Gabriel's 'Solsbury Hill'
Beck -Velvet Underground's 'Sunday Morning'
John Cale -Johnathan Richman's 'Pablo Picasso'

Machine Head doing Message In A Bottle....

Fear Factory - Cars

Oh, and of course....

This really tells Duffy where to get off.

!!! can't do wrong for me

is a cover of this

Not forgetting

Edit: Just noticed that somebody else posted the vastly inferior HM/HB version. This one's far more shouty and therefore wins.

Placebo - Running up that hill.

Mercy by 3rd Degree

he got it

NS do DM. I love Nad Surf.

I feel every word when she sings it!

he got it

The Frank & Walters - Cemetry Gates
I like the bass line. 🙂

Futureheads - Hounds Of Love

Tricky cover of Black Steel by Public Enemy

This +1,000,000

Others I quite enjoy:

The Ukrainians - Venus in Furs
Ella Fitzgerald - Sunshine of your Love
Julie Driscoll / Brian Auger - Season of the Witch
Can't remember who it's by, but featuring Brian Molko out of Placebo - Summertime Rolls
The Third Degree - Can't Get You Out of My Head
The Third Degree - Mercy
Metallica - Stone Cold Crazy

As well as those covers that have sort of become so definitive in the mainstream consciousness that lots of peeps don't realise they're not the originals:

Hendrix - Hey Joe
The Clash - I Fought the Law
The Specials - Message to You, Rudy
Aretha Franklin - Respect

Does the Anthrax / Chuck D version of Bring the Noise count as a cover? If so, then that too.

This is brilliant:

Thought of some more:

ti_pin_man - Member
usually most covers ruin a good song...

That last one put me in mind of The Dynamics:

Okay, one more from The Dynamics. Can't not have a Herbie Hancock number somewhere:

This one is a bit marmite - if you saw my record collection, you'd expect me to hate it, but I think it's rather good:

No sound on the work 'puter so apologies if the sound on this is cack...

That Ukrainians one I mentioned earlier, the best version I've heard of an oft covered song:

The Ramones - What a wonderful world
Ataris - Boys of summer
Jeff Buckley-Hallelujah

I'm normally a Placebo fan, but I can't get on with their version of Running Up The Hill.

Also hating that Futureheads one so it must be a Kate Bush thing.

Hmm, I seem to be the loudmouth dominating the conversation in this thread a bit..

If you only click on one of the links I've posted, make it the Julie Driscoll one. I really can't overstate how wonderful her voice is on that song. The video is a wee bit dated, I grant you, so maybe just listen to the audio....

All Along The Watchtower - Hendrix version
DEVO doing Satisfaction

Another cover version of 'Motorhead'.

Nearly the whole of Nick Cave (&co)'s kicking against the pricks is splendid

(please, nobody mention Johnny Cash and the mercy seat 😐 )

A couple I've not heard in a while. The jury's out on both, I reckon:

or this:

quite often, a good cover will not sound like a cover - I know I was surprised to find several excellent songs I thought were originals were actually covers, e.g.

(originally be joe jackson?)

and

( [url= http://lyxus.net/jiob ]co-written by Christos Demetriou and performed by John Kongos in 1971[/url] )

How the hell have I only just remembered this beauty?

@nbt

I recall when Step On was out (the Mondays version) Annie Nightingale played literally dozens of different versions of the song on her request show. Can't remember who a single one of them was by, unfortunately.

And I certainly never realised, until you posted it, that Got The Time wasn't an Anthrax original. Cheers

And on the subject of covers which people think are the originals, here's the (much better) original of a well known cover:

China Drum - Wuthering Heights

XTC did a great version of All Along THe Watchtower

[i]And on the subject of covers which people think are the originals...[/i]

I'm glad you posted that because I was beginning to think you liked cover versions [i]a little bit too much[/i]... 😉

Sorry, they just keep popping into my head:

I challenge anyone to make it all the way through this.
Final Countdown.

Dezb,

Yeah, a bit sad, but when I was a student I used to trawl charity shops specifically looking for obscure cover versions...

I also used to DJ a bit and have been known to play cover-only sets when the crowd were so pissed they wouldn't care what was played (rowing / rugby club sort of events).

I am, in fact, very, very sad........

mulletus,

BAD cover versions... now that's a road you really, really shouldn't have gone down.

Hmmm, where to start..... how about....

You know what, sometimes one appalling Limp Bizkit ruination of a Jane's Addiction song just isn't enough:

I'd better stop now....

Good shouts on Tori Amos [i]Smells Like Teen Spirit[/i] and Nirvana's [i]Man Who Sold The World[/i]. They're on my list too.

Annoyed/Embarrassed to say I really like David Gray's [i]Say Hello, Wave Goodbye[/i]. Nice couple of Van Morrison nods at the end of it, too.

Each to their own an all that!
I'll dig out the cassette of my old band doing "Careless Whisper" when I get home. It's much much better than the Gossip version, which is crap. Actually I don't think I've got that cassette anymore.
Maybe the "Moonage Daydream" cover my other band did. That's obscure, I'll rip that. Ah, that had no vocals. Oh well.

[i]BAD cover versions... now that's a road you really, really shouldn't have gone down.[/i]

No, cos it's 90% of this thread! 😉

I think this is one of the few covers to make me go "Wow!" when I first heard it..

You want bad cover versions?

Shall I link to the youtube video of my works xmas party where a few of us did "let me entertain you" amongst others?

for the sake of your ears (*and my job as I'm not supposed to spread the link) I shan't 😀

The essential Richard Berry covers (although given that the Kingsmen played it all wrong and Iggy's is based on that, his is more of a cover of a cover of Richard Berry I suppose):

As an aside, I much preferred the Black Keys back then when there was only drums, guitar and vox, and they could make a whole album in 30 hours.

grateful dead doing ‘she belongs to me‘ by dylan. the live version on the dvd backstage pass is awsome, garcia‘s playing is sublime