What is your favorite cover?

Truly the Byrds' Mr. Tambourine Man and their other Dylan covers. But right now all I can think of is Tony Bennett doing George Harrison's "Something in the Way She Moves." Big. Lush. Gorgeous. Excellent recording, too.

Johnny Cash - Hurt

80% of the Led Zeppelin catalog.

There are so many great covers that I would not be able to decide a favorite. So, I'll go with a lesser known one that is currently popular on my Spotify "discovered" playlist:

Annie Keating - "Cowgirl in the Sand"

 

 

 

Righteous Brothers "Unchained Melody"

Roy Orbison or Nazareth: "Love Hurts" 

Willie and Paula Nelson: "Have You Ever Seen the Rain"

Nouvelle Vague: "Guns of Brixton"

Cowboy Junkies:" Thunder Road"

Klaus Nomi: "Just One Look"

Yoko Ono: "Someone Like You"

 

Okay the last two are sort of a joke, but you have to see the wild videos on them.

Bob Dylan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower".

A few more:

Garcia/Grisman: "Friend of the Devil"

Ryan Adams: "Wonderwall"

Eagles: "Take it Easy"

 

And more of the crazy covers:

Dolly Parton: "Stairway to Heaven"

Captain Kirk: "Mr. Tambourine Man" and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds"

Sebastian Cabot: "It Ain't Me Babe"

Andy Griffith: "House of the Rising Sun"

 

And an entire album:

Easy Star All-Stars: "Dub Side of the Moon"

One of my favorite albums of covers is "If I Were a Carpenter," which is a collection of different artists covering songs by the Carpenters.  I particularly like Redd Kross' "Yesterday Once More" and Shonen Knife's "Top of the World."

Deep Purple covers of Help, Kentucky Woman and Hush.

Yes cover of Every little thing.

Jimi Hendrix cover of all along the watchtower

 

I kinda like Guns and Roses covers, such as "Live and Let Die" and "knockin on Heaven's Door."

There are some people whose voice I like a lot, but, when they cover favorite songs, it almost hurts to hear the travesty.  The ultimate one woman wrecking crew for me is Linda Ronstadt:

"Alison" (Elvis Costello)

"Carmelita" and "Hasten Down the Wind" (and a whole bunch of other Zevon songs)

"Blue Bayou" (Orbison)

 

I have a real soft spot for Incognito's cover (with Mario Bondi) of Boz Scaggs' Lowdown...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dHnsBZ_kL0I

Plenty of great covers of Leonard Cohen songs.  Among my favorite:

Concrete Blonde: "Everybody Knows"

Jeff Buckley: "Hallelujah"

R.E.M.: "First We Take Manhattan"

How about a banjo version of Slayer's "Raining Blood":

 

Ry Cooder's take on Get Rhythm.  

 

Here's another nice one. A live cover of Joni Mitchell's - "River" by Indigo Girls...

 

And another one from Indigo Girls - "Midnight Train to Georgia"

 

Lisa Bassenge Trio's cover of James Brown's I Feel Good.

Excellent, and especially on a good system!

Warren Haynes One (U2)

if we are asking for our favorites, these are on my very short list......and have stood the test of time.

--Eva Cassady "Somewhere Over The Rainbow".

--The Animals "House of the Rising Sun"

--Cream "Crossroads".

--Allman Brothers "Stormy Monday"

or are we asking for the most obscure or most interesting?

different answer.

Byrds "Mr. Tambourine Man" (Dylan)

Sinead O'Connor "Sacrifice" (Elton)

Leon "Jumpin' Jack Flash/Youngblood" from Concert For Bangladesh

As usual with these types of threads, most people totally disregarded the OP’s clearly stated request of "favorite cover", meaning one, NOT a list. And yes, I know it’s hard to pick just one but I did it. It can be done.

So how many do we get? 3, 6, 8, 10? Guess I’ll come up with my top 50 and list them tomorrow. See how meaningless that makes all of our responses? Is this Reddit or Audiogon?

 

All the cuts on the CD   "Poet "

a tribute to Townes Van Zandt 

 

Unbelievable. OK, @vair68robert, you want to go totally off topic with a whole album of covers, I give you Mark Lanegan’s Imitations, you won’t see that one talked about in his obits, a brilliant and underappreciated recording. Comes with a special bonus just for Audiogon members. Outstanding sound quality.

@middlemass How 'bout taking a less doctrinaire approach? How about taking initial posts such as the one here as conversation starters, not instructions written in cyber stone? We used to call these sorts of websites "Chat Rooms." Chat! Have fun! Don't think of them as Interrogation rooms.

Johnny Winter "Highway 61 Revisited"

Levon Helm "Take Me To The River"

Harry Nilsson "Without You"

CSN&Y "Woodstock"

Joe Cocker " With a Little Help From My Friends"

Johnny Cash "Hurt"

Whitney Houston "I Will Always Love You"

Jimi Hendrix "All Along The Watchtower"

Guns N' Roses "Knockin' on Heaven's Door"

Linda Ronstadt "Hey Mister That's Me Up On The Jukebox"

Van Halen "You Really Got Me"

Devo "Satisfaction"

Bloomfield, Stills & Cooper "Season of the Witch"

Barenaked Ladies “Lovers in a Dangerous Time” 

Rod Stewart "Have I Told You Lately That I Love You"

Jose Feliciano "Light My Fire"

Nina Simone "I Put a Spell on You"

The Temptations "Papa Was a Rollin" Stone"

Marvin Gaye "I Heard It Through The Grapevine"

 

 

 

 

 

@middlemass 

Jeez. Maybe you should chill out a bit.

I am so sorry for posting more than one "favourite". 

Unfortunately my favourite changes with my mood and the circumstances under which I hear it. So you are just going to have to put up with this anarchy.

Warren Zevon did Knockin on Heavin's Door (I believe) after he'd been diagnosed  with terminal cancer.

All Along the watchtower cover by Bear McCreary (from Battlestar Galactica)

On YouTube e.g:

Josh Turner
Carson Mckee
Reina Del Cid
Toni ? last name

All 4 very talented and have great covers of everything from Beach Boys (sleep John B) to Stuck in the middle with you, to Ramble on. (Reina and Toni), to Pink Moon (Josh) to Dylan and Beatles and often work together/in various permutations.

Shane Ericks: Superstar or anything by carpenters--sounds very much like Karen

 

Pretenders cover of the Kinks Stop your Sobbing

 middlemass ?

I will give the Mark Lanegan's Imitations a listen , 

but he is just one person . POET has a different artist for each song ,

like Steve Earle , Cowboy Junkies , John Prince , Emmylou Harris ,

Lucinda Williams , hard to pick just one .

I could have easily said Judy Collins or Pearl Jam  " Masters of War "  Bob Dylan 

or Eric Burdon and War " Nights in White Satin "  The Moody Blues 

The thing about asking for a favorite is to get others to see what's out there that they themselves haven't discovered .

I love Tony1954's list .  

@berner99 - I loved how they used 'All Along the Watchtower' in BSG!!!!! 

For favorite cover, I'll go with Jello Biafra's version of "They're Coming To Take Me Away".... 

it hurts Me too - Barefoot Servant

 

And for those who want memorable, as in cover with appliances that you may wish you could forget...

Hurra Torpedo - Total Eclipse Of The Heart (Bonnie Tyler cover) (1995) - YouTube

Not one fave, a big covers p/l, including

 

Rumer - Long, Long Day.

Lani Hall - At The Ballet

Carpenters - Fun, Fun, Fun

Ray Charles - Still Crazy After All These Years

Jerry Lee & Nashville Teens - What’d I Say

The Association - Seven Virgins

Liquid Smoke - Hard To Handle

Warren Funderbuk - Bluer Than Blue.

The Beatnix - Step Inside Love.

Brasil 66 - Day Tripper.

Lewis Taylor - Love Light

Anthony Molinaro - Lady Madonna

Three Dog Night - Lady Samantha

Biff Rose - Fill Your Heart 

Phil Brown - Love Or Confusion

 

Most Hayseed Dixie

IMO, to rate as a great cover, the artist has to transform the song in such a way it transends the original.  A good examole of this is Sax player Tom Scott with his version of Ode To Billie Joe.  Give it a listen and see if you agree.  His sax work is subtle and very tasty.  

 

WINNER! WINNER!

berner99, your "Total Eclipse of the Heart" video is fantastic.  

I like the quilt my mom made me the best.

For music Take me to river - Talking Heads

 

 

middlemass

658 posts

03-09-2022 at 10:14pm 

As usual with these types of threads, most people totally disregarded the OP’s clearly stated request of "favorite cover", meaning one, NOT a list. And yes, I know it’s hard to pick just one but I did it. It can be done.

So as not to cause any further upset, I have very carefully limited my nomination to just one, which I’m surprised no one has mentioned:  Black Magic Woman by Santana.  I’m hoping, though, to avoid being ruthlessly grilled by middlemass or his henchmen, as I would then have to admit I’ve never heard the original.

 

And shoutout to onhwy61:  good one!  Yes, some of us do pay attention…

 

 

onhwy61

4,764 posts

03-09-2022 at 02:56pm 

Bob Dylan's cover of Jimi Hendrix's "All Along the Watchtower".

Smokestack Lightnin’ by the Yardbirds, orig Howlin’ Wolf

Woodstock by Eva Cassidy orig Joni Mitchell

Summertime by Janis Joplin, orig George Gershwin

Ball and Chain by Janis Joplin, orig Big MamaThornton

Recently discovered Motorheads version of "Heros" by Bowie. Absolutely brilliant. Can't help but keep thinking of the Ukrainian resistance stand against that tyrant while listening to it.  Been bringing me to tears.

Considering that she co-wrote the song, I don’t know which is the original and which is the cover, but, in any case, I like Marianne Faithfull’s version of “Sister Morphine” more than that of the Rolling Stones’.

Not exactly a cover as it's Leonard Cohen performing his own song, but with a mind blowing assist by Sonny Rolllins.  Perhaps from David Sanborn TV show maybe 2006.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j2T274bXIxU

King Crimson - Court of the Crimson King

Gentle On My Mind - Glenn Campbell

Susanna Hoffs (featuring Aimee Mann) covering Badfinger’s “Name Of The Game.”

It seems nobody listed "Red Red Wine" by UB40, a Neil Diamond cover.  The story goes UB40 thought they were covering a raggae song by N. Diamond from Jamaica, only to learn later they were covering a white Jewish guy from Brooklyn.  Nothing can beat that.

Depends on the genre.

Easy Listening - The Sounds of Silence (Simon&Garfunkel/Disturbed)

Folk - All Along The Watchtower (Bob Dylan/Hendrix)

Metal - Into The Void (Black Sabbath/Exhorder)

Instrumental - Little Wing (Hendrix/SRV - Live at El Mocambo)

Really hard decisions here, so I'm going to have to go with 2, sorry about that!

I Put A Spell On You - Debbie Davis, Kenny Neal & Tab Benoit, this is mostly Tab Benoit - a really talented guy

Tonight I'll Be Staying Here With You - The Jeff Beck Group

Plus, Ry Cooder is the king of cover songs, too many to pick from there.

Alpha Blondy - Wish You Were Here

@bigtwin - thanks for the Tom Scott cover, that was killer!

I could list hundreds of great covers, which I won't; but, here are a few that have been on my radar recently:

Judy Collins - Hello Hooray (Alice Cooper)

John Doe - A Case of You (Joni Mitchell)

Everything But The Girl - Alison (Elvis Costello) 

Everything But The Girl - The Only Living Boy in New York (Simon & Garfunkel)

Marianne Faithfull - Ghost Dance (Patti Smith)

Hall and Oates - Standing in the Shadows of Love (Four Tops)

Hall and Oates - I'll Be Around (Spinners)

Bettye LaVette - When I Was a Young Girl (Savoy Brown)

Nouvelle Vague - Golden Brown (The Stranglers)

Linda Ronstadt - Ooh, Baby Baby (Smokey Robinson & Miracles)

Linda Ronstadt - The Waiting (Tom Petty)

Poco - Magnolia (JJ Cale)

Yes - America (Simon & Garfunkel)