I really love covers. I think that one of the most interesting things to listen to is a new version of a song that you know.
So, when, 1-2 years ago, a few rock artists began releasing covers of (terrible) rap music, I was immediately a fan.
A few favorites:
The covers of rap songs are 75% parody (much higher for the Alanis Morisette one) and 25% genius.
In the vein of covers, though, one I have been listening to rather a lot lately:
3 comments:
I have a whole playlist of these, by the way.
The best of them all is the Sexyback cover by Rock Plaza Central, but it would take some searching to find it on the internet.
My humps is really hard to watch, I'm trying to hear it the way Morissette is singing it, but with the way they're dancing, I can't focus on anything but the way that Fergie sings it! Wierd sight/ear barrier.
Seeing all of these together really gives a good sense of how the cover versions succeed so well. All of them make a huge and hugely clever transformation from the original version of the song. I love all of these, and I actually think in many ways they are more genius than they are parody. Or, at least, in watching them I feel that the predominant response I have is not to laugh like I would at a comedy skit. These videos take themselves seriously as vibrant musical covers in a non-comedic way (they create a dissonant aural and cultural harmony that makes the words come alive again in new and different ways...as Teresa notes they even create a weird almost discmforting effect in relation to the popular originals)...even the morisette "humps" one which does use parody-ish images in the video...is strangely complex. I'd never heard the Nina Gordon "Straight Outta Compton" cover before (is that one as well known?) but I thought that was plain marvelous.
The ideas behind the sound of these rap song covers is also of course directly related to what I wanted you to see by attaching soundtracks with differing emotional qualities to the same visual info. It can make for great twists in tension. Excellent and entertaning post, Robyn. Thanks.
I've always loved Cat Power covering the Rolling Stnes too!
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