OK, favorite remakes? These come to mind:
1. Mad World-Gary Jules
2. Bastards of Young-Jesse Malin
3. Lady-The Dan Band
From William Shatner's Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds to Richard Cheese's Enter Sandman, talentless hacks are always going to be out there ruining perfectly good songs. Some remakes are poorly done, but some seem to border on sacrilege. I wonder if we could identify the elements of awful remakes, for the future of mankind, offer guidelines for making acceptable remakes. Any ideas, you musicians?
6 comments:
As much as I love Britney Spears in her own right (Ooops...., Hit Me..., Lucky, and the greatest dance pop song of all time, Toxic), her remake of Satisfaction was horrible. And I don't even like that song that much in the first place. Devo's cover of it rocks the world.
A remake is a indeed tricky endeavor. A note-for-note remake, including improvised vocalizations, is not a "respectful" cover. It's shower singing.
Conversely, you gotta bring something new to the table without cocking it up completely.
Anybody remember the Ramones tribute a few years back? Lots of good examples there.
You couldn't swing a bat without hitting a shower singer. Meanwhile, Rob Zombie changed the mother-scratchin' chord progression to "Blitzkrieg Bop." BIG no no.
So who got it right? Eddie Vedder and Zeke doing "I Believe In Miracles." Sped up, rocked out, and heartfelt.
Oh, and Tom Waits doing "Return Of Jackie And Judy." It's almost unrecognizable, but it's Tom Waits, so it works.
Ah, speaking of Darth Vedder, that Love Reign O'er Me is indeed shower singing.
You just keep thinking, Jay, that's what you're good at.
Pophead's remake of Fuck and Run, which is featured currently at the Pophead myspace site, was a fuckin' hit.
Subteens cover of You May Be Right is excellent as was the pepped-up Brand New Cadilac in the live shows.
The Clash knew how to it - Brand New Cadillac, I Fought The Law, Police and Thieves. All great. All sounded like they owned the songs.
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