Re: Best Cover Songs
GNR's Knockin on Heaven's Door is awesome. And I don't even like GNR.
Warren Zevon also covered this on his final album which he recorded knowing he only had a few weeks left to live.
Gloria by Van Morrison and by Patti Smyth are both decent versions. Although I still prefer the original by Shadows of Knight.
Crimson and Clover by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts is also a fave of mine...but again I prefer the original by Tommy James and the Shondells.
The Muffs did a cover of Kids in America but it doesn't even come close to the original by Kim Wilde.
Ice-Cream Man by Van Halen has to be a cover but I don't know the original artist off the top of my head.
Van Halen's Jump was covered as kind of a ballad by Aztec Camera and I think I actually prefer the cover for having a certain vision to vary from the original approach so much.
Our Lips are Sealed by the Go Go's was covered by a band called Fun Boy Three and I liked that version a lot too.
Some of the cover-compilations are kind of fun too but are usually disappointing.
One example is If I Were a Carpenter with alternative rock-artists doing songs by the Carpenters.
Cracker singing Rainy Days and Mondays should be a lot funnier...but they really did it terribly and instead just made it really annoying.
Same for Grant Lee Buffalo's "We've only Just Begun" and Sheryl Crow singing "Solitaire"
Finally, my nomination for the cover version that I hate the most is Amy Grant's "It's Too Late" originally by Carole King.
Amy Grant hardly changes a single note in the entire song from the original version, but the singing and piano throughout the whole song just feel so completely hollow and soul-less and kind of pompous.
It's amazing how just little differences can completely change an entire song like that.
If I had heard Amy Grant's version first I probably would give the song about a 4.5.
But Carole King's version got an almost immediate 10 with me because it's just that good.
There's a band called "Me First and the Gimme Gimme's" with fast-ska versions of familiar songs like You've Got a Friend, Blowin in the Wind, Hello (by Lionel Ritchie), Nothing Compares 2 U, Neil Diamond stuff, etc etc.
It gets old pretty fast but it's still some really fun stuff.
I wouldn't mind seeing them in concert sometime.
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