Each week I'm posting a random or not-so-random cover song. Only the current week's track will be available but if you see a past one you'd like, contact me and we'll make arrangements.
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Sunday, May 20th, 2012
Allo Darlin’ cover Bruce Springsteen
Amazon.comThis week’s selection is more geographically topical than anything as while I’m not actually in New Jersey, but I did land there en route to Brooklyn, and if I were to trek down to the waterfront I could see the Garden State. Not Atlantic City, though, as that’s still a ways away.
And while I’m not here specifically for NYC Popfest, it’s a bit of fortuitous timing that will let me catch Allo Darlin’ in Littlefield in Brooklyn tonight in closing the festivities. They covered New Jersey’s favourite son – that’s Bruce Springsteen and not Jon Bon Jovi, just so we’re clear – as part of a 2009 tribute album entitled Play Some Pool – Skip Some School – Act Real Cool: A Global Pop Tribute To Bruce Springsteen. With an indiepop-skewed roster of artists, it may have sought to prove the Boss’ influence went beyond just folk singers and bar rockers and having not heard the whole thing I can’t comment on how well it did, but I think Allo Darlin’ did a good job of capturing the darker tones of “Atlantic City” while still sounding like them.
Tonight’s show marks the end of their North American tour in support of Europe – hopefully not the last leg as they didn’t make it up to Toronto this time around – and Springsteen will be embarking on the second leg of his tour behind Wrecking Ball later this Summer, hitting The Rogers Centre in Toronto on August 24. Maybe Allo Darlin’ can open?
MP3: Allo Darlin’ – “Atlantic City”
Video: Bruce Springsteen – “Atlantic City”
Sunday, May 13th, 2012
PS I Love You covers Rush
Paper Bag RecordsIn writing up PS I Love You’s new album Death Dreams earlier this month, I made reference to the record’s more overt prog-rock influence which had only been hinted at on their debut Meet Me At The Muster Station.
And while you might assume that growing up in southern Ontario that Toronto’s own Rush would have been a logical assumption as influence, that’s not the case. As Paul Saulnier told Rolling Stone, he hated the band – as many do – until his mid-teens and it was “Subdivisions”, from the band’s 1982 album Signals, that turned him around – now he’s a self-proclaimed, “mega Rush fan” – as many are. I don’t count myself among them, but those early ’80s Rush albums do hold a special place in my heart. For serious.
Their cover of the Damascene tune appeared on last year’s Figure It Out, a stop-gap compilation of singles and EPs released to satiate fans while they worked on Death Dreams, and while it doesn’t get as fret-shredding as you’d expect a tribute to Alex Lifeson by a player as accomplished as Saulnier might be, remember that he’s also gotta pretend to be Geddy Lee with his feet. Cut the guy some slack.
PS I Love You kick of their Spring tour in support of Death Dreams at The Garrison in Toronto on Tuesday. Rush release their millionth (approximately) album in Clockwork Angels on June 12 and play the Air Canada Centre on June 12.
MP3: PS I Love You – “Subdivisions”
Video: Rush – “Subdivisions”
Sunday, May 6th, 2012
Richard Hawley covers The Jesus & Mary Chain
Frank YangI’d actually decided on this song for this week’s selection a while ago – the fact that Richard Hawley’s new album Standing At The Sky’s Edge was coming out in the UK this week was more than enough excuse to dig out this track.
It dates back to 2006 when it appeared both as a b-side to the 7″ of “Hotel Room” taken from Cole’s Corner and as part of Q‘s Covered: Best of 86/06 CD compilation, which got artists doing stuff that year to reinterpret artists who were doing stuff two decades earlier and in this case, it meant The Jesus & Mary Chain – Hawley tackled the title track of the Some Candy Talking EP which came out in the Summer of 1986, not long after their 1985 debut Psychocandy.
The point being that it was on deck before the JAMC announced their first Toronto show in some fifteen years last week, making a date to play The Phoenix on August 3. But hey, double context – I’ll take it.
MP3: Richard Hawley – “Some Candy Talking”
Video: The Jesus & Mary Chain – “Some Candy Talking”
Sunday, April 29th, 2012
The Twilight Singers cover My Bloody Valentine
WikipediaIf the accompanying image this post looks familiar, it may be because I went to this record – The Twilight Singers’ 2004 covers album She Loves You – as recently as last October for a selection. And why not? As I mentioned in that writeup, Greg Dulli is a master of the cover version and any excuse he gives me to listen to or share one of them, I’ll probably take it. And getting The Afghan Whigs back together – as he did this year for live dates both festival and not – counts. So why not post a Whigs-era track, which I’ve got more than a few of? Because he didn’t cover My Bloody Valentine with them, turning the one of the band’s poppiest songs into a loungey piano number (but with guitars – no heresy here) with a Bette Midler coda (really), and the long-awaited MBV reissues – they were announced back in early 2008 to coincide with their own reunion dates – are finally coming out. No really, they are.
Slicing Up Eyeballs has got actual photos of the remastered Loveless and Isn’t Anything reissues as well as the new double-disc EPs 1988-1991 compilation CD sets and after being teased by non-working advances a few times, I finally heard them this weekend. They’re real, people. And they’re out May 7. With so much productivity, maybe the Pitchfork interview where Kevin Shields said a new album was almost done has some truth to it? Of course, just because it’s been recorded doesn’t mean it’ll come out. These releases had been recorded for over twenty years, after all. Bassist Deb Googe clearly isn’t waiting on further MBV activities to fill her calendar; she’s followed Shields’ footsteps and joined Primal Scream.
The Twilight Singers, who released Dynamite Steps just last year, are on the shelf while The Afghan Whigs collect their due over a decade after calling it quits. That they’ve begun announcing North American dates (well, New York) makes me hopeful that more are coming. They’ve been kind of the unofficial soundtrack of my 2012.
MP3: The Twilight Singers – “When You Sleep”
Stream: My Bloody Valentine – “When You Sleep”
Sunday, April 22nd, 2012
Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples cover The Band
YouTubeNot the best week for the world of music, this past one. First there was the news that Robin Gibb of The Bee-Gees, who’d started the month with the good news that his cancer was in remission, had fallen into a coma due to pneumonia; then on Wednesday, Dick Clark was felled by a heart attack. Arguably the hardest blow came Thursday, however, when it was announced that Levon Helm – drummer and vocalist for The Band – had passed away from a battle with cancer that he’d seemingly beaten over a decade earlier.
His loss was immediately felt all throughout the music world, with tributes by way of covers of The Band’s music ringing out from stages everywhere. This week’s selection wasn’t one of them, but instead comes from a dressing room at Chicago’s Civic Opera House in December of last year. Helm was still alive and well, then, so all that Wilco, Nick Lowe, and Mavis Staples were saluting at that time was one of the great songs of twentieth century popular music, one which easily transcends geography, genre and generations.
Jeff Tweedy and Glenn Kotche of Wilco were just some of the countless artists who paid tribute to Helm this weekend; Bob Dylan was another. There are worthy looks back at Helm’s life and legacy at Exclaim, The AV Club, and Billboard.
Nick Lowe is in town tomorrow night for a show at The Phoenix in support of his latest record The Old Magic. Wilco continue to tour last year’s The Whole Love; Band songs have graced their set lists in the past and it’s not unreasonable to expect that they’ll be working their way back in. Mavis Staples released the Jeff Tweedy-produced You Are Not Alone back in 2010 – she’s still on the road for that one.
And in a bit of good news, Robin Gibb is out of his coma.
MP3: Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples – “The Weight” (live – Chicago, December 2011)
Video: Wilco, Nick Lowe & Mavis Staples – “The Weight” (live – Chicago, December 2011)
Video: The Band – “The Weight” (live – Festival Express, 1970)
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