There must be some kind of way out of here

[venta]

Well, today NME has published a chart of the "best cover versions of all time".

It's here: http://www.nme.com/news/muse/53090

Virtually none of them meet my criteria for a good cover. In particular, I don't believe that most people will have had any idea that the songs were covers when they first heard them. If someone had to tell you the song you know is a cover, it doesn't count.


[Poll #1622076]

Other reasons why the NME is wrong: in their corresponding chart of the worst cover versions ever, Madonna's American Pie only makes #8.

Edit The Beatles' song should of course be Twist and Shout. Search and replace error :)

Comments

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

AFAIK 'Hey Joe' is an arrangement of a traditional song, and therefore can't be counted as a cover. Of course, Hendrix may be basing it on someone else's arrangement, but as far as I'm concerned it's like saying that Simon & Garfunkel's version of Scarborough Fair is a cover.

[venta.livejournal.com]

I just went to look for Muse's cover of Feeling Good (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CmwRQqJsegw), and of course I know it... I just had no idea it was a cover.

Also: yikes, scary scary faces.

[mrlloyd.livejournal.com]

Hmm. My knowledge of All Along the Watchtower went U2, Dylan, Hendrix...

There's also the awful version used by Battlestar Galactica, but I don't want to know who that was by or where it came from...

[phlebas.livejournal.com]

...But not Elvis's version of Blue Suede Shoes?

Hmm. Does your definition mean that something stops being a good cover when it becomes better known than the original? As opposed to the original being obscure to start with, I mean?

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

I think they are right that Feeling Good is a great cover. But yay Muse. They were fab live when I saw them both times. But dunno about the rest. Sometimes I'm stuck in the poll because I'm now not sure if I know the original cover or what.

[bopeepsheep.livejournal.com]

Where's 'I know the original and have never heard the cover'? ;-) I had to go and look for the White Stripes' version in order to answer the last one. ('Don't know it at all' to me suggests not knowing the song, which is not something I could answer for that one, unlike the Nirvana/whoever one.)

[ar-gemlad.livejournal.com]

On looking up 'Twist and shout', it seems that what I thought was the original was the cover by The Isley Brothers! So I think that still proves your point...

[triskellian]

Many of my answers are blurred by knowing I've heard at least two versions of the song, but not necessarily knowing who they're by, or what order I heard them in. Or, in the case of Muse, I'd heard (presumably) the original before I heard the Muse version, but Muse have since entirely eclipsed it in my head.

Oh, and I've never heard the Johnny Cash 'Hurt', but was amused by someone at Reading a few years ago tallying the covers NIN played and including it because he had no idea it was their song first ;-)

[mr-tom.livejournal.com]

NME publishes contentious list of editors' favourites and mysteriously gain a lot of hits (of the webular variety) shocker.

Besides, they're all wrong. The worst cover ever is Soft Cell's "Tainted Love" and the best is The Gourds' "Gin & Juice".

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

I hope you're shortly going to present us with an in-depth statistical analysis of these poll responses?

[ulfilias.livejournal.com]

4.)This is an odd one and the origional doesn't really exist. I knew it wasn't actualy credited as Hendrix though.

6.) I fought the law....I knew *A* cover before the clash version as it was one of those songs that had almost permiated into folk song like status, but i couldn't have told you who did it....I'm also guessing (after wiki) that most people wouldn't know the origional version, just an earlier famous cover

7.) Don't know the cover. But i'm presuming it is a version of the Leonard Cohen trac, which is awesome. I'm now hunting the cover version.

[beckyl.livejournal.com]

Most of the time, I don't know who's singing stuff, and when I do, I'm almost always wrong about whether it's a cover or an original. My best howler was 'Knocking on Heaven's Door' as a Guns and Roses original.