venta

Right. After more than a twelvemonth of absence, it's time for the return of the Friday afternoon mp3.

It's Friday, and it's about 3 o'clock. It's time to go underneath the covers (with the lights out).

I always recommend listening to a cover version without knowing what or who it is, so click on the link and don't look at your media player too carefully...

Link to cover version expired

Nick Cave, covering Disco 2000, originally by Pulp.

One of the reasons I love cover versions of songs is that an artist can grab a song, and make it into something totally different. If you're a bread-and-butter covers band then fine, go ahead and knock out the notes, you're probably aiming to sound as much like the original as possible. But if you're an established artist, maybe trying to do something a bit quirky, then take on a song that's way out of your genre and make it different.

Which is why I love this version of Disco 2000. Not only is Nick Cave poles apart from Jarvis Cocker in manner, delivery, songwriting and practically everything. Not only has he taken a bit of up-tempo indie and made it into an acoustic ballad. He's put it in a different time signature. Now that's the kind of covering I can get behind.

[NB. If musical terms like 'time signature' wig you out: you could do a slow waltz to this version. All you could do to the original was jump up and down.]

I acquired my version of this track on a cover disc ('scuse the pun) on Q magazine. Cover discs on music magazines often have hidden gems: they want an "exclusive", so you'll often get a session version of a well-known hit, or a B-side, or a one-off cover. Keep an eye out for interesting stuff next time you're in the newsagents (though cover discs seem to be getting rarer.)

Apparently this version of Disco 2000 was actually recorded as a B-side to the Pulp single Bad Cover Version. You can find Bad Cover Version on YouTube; the video is well worth a look.