Categories
Tunes

100 best covers: #60 Gnarls Barkley “Gone daddy gone”

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I’m sure that all of you recall a little ditty called “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley. I distinctly remember seeing the video for it for the first time late one Friday night in 2006 on The Wedge and being drawn in and mesmerized by the Rorschach style ink blots that formed and re-formed images of the performers and such. And man, was that song catchy. I immediately went on the hunt for the album on which it appeared, “St. Elsewhere”, and learned that Gnarls Barkley was the duo of R&B wonder vocalist CeeLo Green and Midas touch uberproducer Brian Burton (aka Danger Mouse). Of course, “Crazy” went ubiquitous and intergalactic as a hit but the rest of the album was quite excellent too – a compelling collection of genre-bending and genre-defying tracks – and produced two more singles, the last being the double A-side release of “Who cares?” and this very song, a cover of Violent Femmes’ “Gone daddy gone”*

Now, to close these posts, I typically give my opinion (and solicit your own) on whether I prefer the original or the cover but I am going to get this out of the way right now. Though the cover is quite excellent, I am going with the original here. It appears as track nine on the iconic self-titled debut album by the Milwaukee based trio. It is just over three minutes of punk and folk mashup and with a jazz-type song structure, including not one but two xylophone solos performed by bassist Brian Ritchie. In fact, I love how each performer takes their turn in the solo spotlight in such a short barn-burner and no one misses a beat.

It is amazing though and a testament to the range of music influences that surged through “St. Elsewhere” that CeeLo and Brian chose to cover a lesser known Violent Femmes tune from over thirty years prior and did so, faithfully. The cover is thirty seconds shorter and using digital sounds rather than organic instruments, managed to even speed it up some. It introduced a whole new audience to a great track and like many successful covers, the new audience fell for it, not necessarily even aware of its origins. And man, does that CeeLo have a voice!

Thoughts?

Cover:

The original:

*Interestingly, Violent Femmes’ original is also a cover of sorts, including a complete lyrical verse of Willie Dixon‘s “I just want to make love to you”. Hence, the shared writing credit.

For the rest of the 100 best covers list, click here.

Categories
Vinyl

Vinyl love: Weezer “Weezer”

(Vinyl Love is a series of posts that quite simply lists, describes, and displays the pieces in my growing vinyl collection. You can bet that each record was given a spin during the drafting of each corresponding post.)

Artist: Weezer
Album Title: Weezer
Year released: 1994
Year reissued: 2016
Details: Mobile Fidelity, limited edition, numbered 011775, 180 gram, transparent blue

The skinny: Just over three weeks ago, fellow blogger Super Dekes over at Thunder Bay Arena Rock posted a review of Weezer’s self-titled album (also widely-known as ‘the Blue album’) and mentioned how he had finally gotten a copy of it on vinyl the previous summer. Coincidentally, I had tracked down a vinyl copy of it myself that very week and when I told Deke so, he suggested I also write a review. Well, I figured one of my ‘Vinyl love’ posts would work just as well, so here we are. I actually saw Weezer live before I heard this album. They opened for shoe gazers Lush at Toronto’s Warehouse in the summer ’94 and at the time, I was only vaguely aware of “The sweater song”. Nonetheless, I was blown away by their set – all crunchy guitars and Beach Boys harmonies – and told Rivers Cuomo as much when I spotted him at the merch table. A friend of mine in university later dubbed a copy of the album for me to cassette and I played the hell out of it. This debut is still Weezer’s most successful piece of music in my books, a classic, and though I spent a few dollars more than did Deke, it was well worth it to procure this limited edition Mobile Fidelity release. They do such a great job all round, what with the remastering, the pressing, and the immaculate packaging. Splendid.

Standout track: “The world has turned and left me here”

Categories
Tunes

Best tunes of 2002: #7 Interpol “PDA”

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“You’re so cute when you’re frustrated, dear
Well, you’re so cute when you’re sedated, dear
I’m resting”

“PDA” is not the first track from Interpol’s debut album to grace this list. “Obstacle 1” came in earlier at number twenty-seven and yeah, I feel like there’s a few other songs from “Turn on the bright lights” that could just as easily belong here. Interpol really did burst into the indie world with this album, leading the charge, nay, almost singlehandedly restarting a post-punk revival, a revolution of sorts.

The quartet of Paul Banks, Daniel Kessler, Carlos Dengler and Greg Drudy originally formed Interpol five years earlier in 1997, but Sam Fogarino replaced Drudy on drums shortly after the release of their first EP, “Fukd ID #3”, in 2000. They have since released six full-length albums and a bunch of EPs and still continue today as a trio (Dengler departed the group in 2010). And though I’ve found their latter day albums not quite as phenomenal as their first couple, I saw them live for the first time in 2015 and their energy, rather than growing tired over the years, was exactly for which you would have hoped when listening to their records.

“PDA”, is actually a re-recording of a re-recording from that aforementioned first EP and it was released as the very first single off “Turn on the bright lights”. The drums crash and explode and then, the guitars burst in, just as percussive and just as menacing. Banks is shaky and neurotic, invoking the haunting memory of Ian Curtis. Yeah, it’s been said before but I feel like the comparison is never more true than on this particular track. It is intense and dark and heartbreaking and exhilarating.

Just press play below and listen to the song.

For the rest of the Best tunes of 2002 list, click here.