Oh lord, please don't let me be misunderstood

[venta]

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 before reading ahead...

Link to cover version expired

That was Muse butchering covering The House of the Rising Sun, originally by The Animals.

Last week I posted a cover version I really liked, and almost everyone who commented hated it. So this week I thought I'd post one I don't like, so you can all tell me how good it is ;)

Today's sounds, to me, like a really bad bootleg: a typical Muse swooshing backing track, with the Animals' lyrics dropped over the top with pretty much no regard for how they fit together. Yes, I know, the singing doesn't sound much like Eric Burdon, and does sound quite a lot like Matt Bellamy. But in general, the singing and the backing track don't seem to have anything to do with each other, they're merely happening at the same time.

I admire the attempt to give such a 60s classic the Muse treatment, but I really don't think it worked.

Comments

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Horrible.

Just horrible.

(I'm not sure you can say "originally by The Animals" - Trad. Arr. surely?)

[venta.livejournal.com]

Dammit, yes. I was intending to say "made famous by" rather than "originally by". That's what cut-and-paste does for you :)

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Just read the Wikipedia page. Eric Burdon learned it in the Bridge Folk & Ballad Club from Johnny Handle of the High Level Ranters? I did not know that! Johnny's lovely, he's a mate of my Dad's.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Fancy that.

I don't know Johnny Handle personally (though I think my parents do), but I've heard him and he's a very, very entertaining guy.

[huskyteer.livejournal.com]

I almost stopped listening after a few seconds because it was so thumpy, then I realised what it was and kept listening. Not bad but not at all the sort of thing I'd usually listen to.

[skorpionuk.livejournal.com]

Yet more reasons to dislike Muse, which I do, intensely... they are the new Smiths for me!

[venta.livejournal.com]

*shuffles feet*
*hangs head*

I liked the Smiths when I was a teenager in a droopy cardigan, and I've never really got over it :)

[skorpionuk.livejournal.com]

It's ok, I don't mind Smiths fans too much... many of them like other things I can agree with them on. It's just that Morrissey winds me up beyond what is reasonable - it doesn't even matter what he does or says, it reduces me to incoherent hatred every time. Sorry.

And Muse - well, actually, now it turns out I was not entirely correct above: I actually find Muse bland, not quite on the level of vitriol reserved for the Smiths. But what annoys me about them is that they _could_ have been good if they'd ever bothered to develop their sound, or vary it, or something.

[timeplease.livejournal.com]

Um. Yes, I can see them quietly wanting to sweep that under the carpet!

Never performed live? Just on an NME cover album? Hmm.

[sushidog.livejournal.com]

I quite like the thing that Muse do, but there really is only one thing that they do, which gets a bit wearing; there's really very little difference between this and their cover of "Feelin' Good", which seems to undermine the point of doing cover versions really.

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Turns out that I basically like Knights of Cydonia and can't tell the difference between anything else they do :)

[venta.livejournal.com]

See also Nightwish, Enya, Inkubus Sukkubus...

(Not that you necessarily like all of those, but they are all bands with only one song!)

[lanfykins.livejournal.com]

Though, as it happens, I do actually like all those :)

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

But Muse don't just have one song. They have two - the shouty rock one and the soft rock one :)

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

I generally like Muse but that was a bit too shouty for my taste.

[bateleur.livejournal.com]

Yup, seconded.

The sad thing is that the Animals' version is a really good fit for Muse's style, but for some reason instead of a nice, clean version full of clever harmonies and fancy guitar they just turned the white noise and distortion up and made a complete mess of it.

[zotz]

Mmm. Prefer Otway's version, personally.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Obviously his is far superior. I feel it should really be experienced live, though, so didn't want to spoil it here for people who'd never heard it.

I did mean to mention it, though.

[zotz]

That's a very good point.

[uitlander]

I think 'butchering' is almost the correct term, if it wasn't so derogatory to butchers.

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Hmm, that was indeed pretty rubbish. I've never made the effort to get into Muse, should I generally?

[venta.livejournal.com]

I'm generally well inclined towards them, but they never quite end up being as good as I want them to be. I've just been listening to someone else's copy of Absolution and the fundamental problem is that everything sounds a bit the same. It's quite a nice same, mind.

onebyone might be the person to ask for specific guidance, as I believe he's a fan.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

I really enjoy Muse, but a lot of people don't. There's not much point tracing the influence of Bellamy's classical piano playing on his guitar solos if you don't like all the distortion and the fact that his sound engineer doesn't mute out his breathing.

Two things must you listen to, to decide whether you'll get anything out of Muse.

The first is Album 1, side 1, track 1: Sunburn from Showbiz, which determines whether you have any interest at all in a Baroqued-up group of Radiohead fans.

The second is Plug In Baby, from Origin of Symmetry, which is probably their best 3-and-a-half-minute radio song and fairly representative of their sound. Although the rest of that album is a surprisingly awkward listen at times.

If you get on with either or both of those, listen to Butterflies & Hurricanes (which is very representative of the lethargo-radical messages of the last three albums, like Rage Against the Machine's politics, but replace rage with a growing sense of disquiet) and Hysteria from Absolution; Map of the Problematique from Black Holes and Revelations; and Uprising from The Resistance, then other things at random.

The quieter song to which Gemlad referred is Unintended on Showbiz, Endlessly on Absolution, etc.

Black Holes and Revelations is a bit prog-rock for my tastes, but if gig attendance is anything to go by then there are people who like Muse's later stuff more than their first 3 albums. Can't say I empathise, but if you suspect you may be the kind of person who makes a day-trip to the Reading festival at 7pm to catch the top three bands on the main stage, it might be best to start with Starlight and Knights of Cydonia.

[onebyone.livejournal.com]

One thing I will say for Starlight, actually, is that if Muse have made one contribution to rock music, it's that they've proved that your basic stadium-going supergroup-watching numpty can clap a triplet every other bar.