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100 best covers: #38 Teenage Fanclub “Mr. Tambourine man”

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Scottish alt rock legends, Teenage Fanclub have appeared many times over on these pages since this blog’s inception. In fact, they’ve already graced this particular list once with their cover of a great track by another iconic Scottish alt-rock band and – spoiler alert – you’ll likely see them again on this list before it reaches its end.

I first heard this particular cover of “Mr. Tambourine Man” when a friend of mine put it on a mixed tape for me. I later learned of its provenance when I found a used copy of the 3-CD compilation “Ruby trax” at Penguin Music in the late 90s, a compilation that has also received due mention in relation to this list of great covers. I remember thinking it quite apt that the Fannies chose to cover this particular track given that I had found that the jangling guitar and harmonizing vocals on their 1993 album “Thirteen” harkened back to the folk rock sound practically invented by The Byrds. Of course, this was before I learned that Teenage Fanclub was just as enamoured of Big Star and that The Byrds’ “Mr. Tambourine Man” was itself a cover of a Bob Dylan track*.

The Teenage Fanclub cover has way more in common with The Byrds version than with Bob Dylan’s original. Indeed, it’s almost an exact replica of The Byrds’ rendition, only a slightly bit shorter and perhaps a bit more raw in the vocals. The Byrds released their cover in spring 1965, less than a month after Dylan released his original. Both of these versions were very successful for those artists, topping charts and inspiring generations of musicians. The Byrds cut a few verses from Dylan’s composition, changed the time signature, and the recording is half the length. It’s 12 string jangle rock versus pure balladeering folk.

You can definitely tell that Teenage Fanclub owed more a debt to The Byrds than to Bob Dylan with their faithful ode. Some might knock them for it, but not me. And though the two covers are quite different from the original I love them all and refuse to go with one over the others.

Cover:

Original:

*Having only had limited exposure to both Dylan and The Byrds via my parents’ oldies radio station listening, I would later go on to learn that The Byrds covered many Bob Dylan tunes while exploring both of their catalogues much, much later.

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

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100 best covers: #43 Ministry “Lay lady lay”

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Though I haven’t really followed them for a very a long time, I was actually quite the Ministry fan back in the early half of the nineties. I enjoyed so much of their early work, right up to their fifth album, 1992’s “Psalm 69”, but by the time they finally followed it up four years later, I had mostly moved on from my industrial kick. However, I still checked out “Filth pig”, borrowing a copy from my good friend Rylan. After a few listens, I recorded two songs that caught my ear for a mixed tape, one of which was this this rocking tune called “Lay lady lay”. It had this wicked ticky-tack drum line, a menacing melody and a shout-along chorus. I had no idea at the time that it was a cover.

I heard the original for the first time a year or so later when my friend Meagan, also one of my housemates at the time, got up to stop said mixed tape in the middle of this tune. “I know this song,” she said, as she popped in a CD and handed me the jewel case. It was some Bob Dylan compilation album and of course, I immediately spotted the song title in the track listing but the song she put on wasn’t quite reconcilable with the Ministry tune I’d rocked along to on countless evenings. It took some time before I was able to put the two in the same room together and I think it was the drum line that finally did it.

Bob Dylan originally wrote “Lay lady lay” way back in 1969 and it appeared on his ninth studio album, “Nashville skyline”. There is a definitely country feel with plenty of slide guitars and Dylan’s crooning vocals that sounds a bit different than on the popular classics I’d previously known by him. He’s imploring a lovely lady to stay with him the night, likely quite suggestive material back when it was released. It has been covered a great many time over the years but according to Ministry’s Al Jourgensen, Dylan found their version particularly “badass”.

I tend to agree. And I have to go with Ministry’s cover over the original on this one. Not my favourite Dylan recording at all.

Cover:

Original:

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

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100 best covers: #72 Cat Power “Stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again”

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Just over a couple of years ago, I participated in a collaborative blog posting extravaganza, for which a number of bloggers around the world all posted words on the same day on Bob Dylan, a theme decided upon in advance. It was a fun exercise, albeit somewhat outside of this particular blog’s normally scheduled programming, and it was interesting to see how all these different writer’s chose to treat the chosen theme. In my case, I opted to write about the 2007 film “I’m not there”, an unorthodox biopic on the iconic singer/songwriter that chose to portray him using four different actors and telling bits about his life using multiple story lines. Of course, given my blog’s music bent, I spoke at length about the soundtrack as well, which is a super long (perhaps too long) double LP made up of covers, rather than the originals, by various artists across the musical spectrum. And perhaps both of these, the film and soundtrack, were as contrarian and confounding as Bob Dylan can be himself.

One of the three tracks I pointed out as amongst my favourites on the soundtrack was this cover by Cat Power of “Stuck inside of Mobile with the Memphis blues again”. Though to be honest, it’s definitely less about the artist performing it than it is the song itself. I know next to nothing about the American singer/songwriter but she definitely stands up to the gauntlet laid down by Dylan on this track. Hers is just shy of the seven and half minute mark of Dylan’s original but her honey smooth vocals keep the energy and the feel true to the original. Both versions bounce and jive along and bring a smile to my face every time. I actually fell in love with Dylan’s original just shy a decade earlier when I heard it on another soundtrack, the one for the very excellent screen adaptation of the Hunter S. Thompson classic, “Fear and loathing in Las Vegas”.

It’s just one of those songs that could go on for ever as far as I’m concerned, even if either singer just devolved into gibberish. And well, I can’t actually decide which version I like better on this one. Thoughts?

Cover:

The original:

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