Cover Versions – Page 28

Peter Painter Painted Pete In Pastels

June 9, 2008June 9, 2008 Craig McAllister

Acclaimed artist and Ayrshireman Peter Howson’s very stylised work sells for tens of thousands of pounds at a time. Many of his paintings are centered around what he has observed in life – hard working men down the mines of Ayrshire, hard drinking men in the rough-round-the-edges pubs we’ve all seen wherever we live. If you look closely enough you might also see a bit of religious imagery in there. At least, I think I can. He’s also painted The Queen, Henrik Larsson and Madonna in the nude (just Madonna, not the other two.) This weekend he has been in the headlines of most of the big papers. He’s just unveiled 6 new works which depict Pete Doherty as dead.

It would appear that the Last of the Great Romantic Poets has a bit of a death wish. Some of you may think this is a good thing. Certainly, many would argue that his best years as a writer are behind him. Howson is no stranger to this sort of criricism himself. After a battle with drink and drugs he found God, then found himself on the frontline in Bosnia as the Governent’s Official War Artist. He says his paintings are a warning to Doherty, that he’s lived the scuzzy lifestyle himself and he fears Doherty will end up dead.

“I’ve painted Pete dead before he ends up that way. This is my warning to him. I don’t want him to die but he surely will soon unless he changes. Pete can influence a whole generation by kicking this evil habit. He could become the right kind of hero. I know what it is like to live the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. I would love to meet Pete and shake some sense into him.”

In one drawing, Doherty is wearing a Dante hat instead of his usual trilby. It’s a reference to Dante‘s poem Divine Comedy, about his trip to hell.

Pete’s people said: “I don’t believe Howson knows Peter so I don’t know where he got his inspiration from. We have not seen the drawings.”

The pictures went on show yesterday (Sunday) at ArtDeCaf, Glasgow.

Anyway, all this gives us a good excuse to get out the Libertines bootlegs and give you some stuff you may never have heard before. First up, Pete plays The La’s. This is a 28 minute studio outtake of him messing around playing ‘Son Of A Gun’, ‘Callin’ All’, ‘Timeless Melody’ and some Smiths stuff amongst a whole rake of familiar and unheard Doherty originals. Sponatneous? Certainly. Rough? Definitely. Essential? Of course! Next up, ‘Hooligans On E’, from another studio session (date unknown, sorry). I bloody love this half-baked, half-finished song. Some of the lyrics are great. Also, you can have this beauty. ‘Road To Ruin’ is different to the album version. It features a great spooky keyboard part. Mostly sung by Carl, it’s just about my favourite Libertines outtake. Finally, if you fancy a lazy Sunday hanging around art galleries looking at paintings of dead people who aren’t dead yet, this is for you. The Libertines do the Small Faces ‘Lazy Sunday’. Originally on the soundtrack to the film ‘Blackball‘, it sounds just as you’d expect. Which is half arsed and out of tune. Of course.

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find

Creepy Prince

May 4, 2008 Craig McAllister

Shhhhhh! Listen! That sound you can hear is the sound of a million Radiohead fans tapping furiously on their iMac 4G Powerbooks as they vent their spleen on the umpteen thousand Thom Yorke Is God fansites that litter every corner of cyberspace.

Prince is a bit creepy. Everyone knows that. But by far the biggest highlight of the recent Coachella festival seems to have been him doing a straight ahead cover of Radiohead‘s ‘Creep‘. It’s true! It’s also very good. Fairly faithful to the original, Prince manages to be both Thom Yorke with added soul and those wee yelps that he’s fond of doing and Jonny Greenwood with the kerrunk-kerrunk guitar before the chorus. His vocals get the full on Purple Rain-era treatment – slight delay, lots of reverb, the exteeeeeeeeendeeeed outro, and I actually think Prince makes this track his own. The audio is taken from this mobile phone video that YouTube won’t show. But it’s reasonably good quality. Worth the download. Click on the video link and you can download the video from there.

Radiohead fans yesterday.

Spot the one that quite likes Prince’s version.

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find

No Cure For Plagiarism

May 4, 2008 Craig McAllister

For a couple of very good reasons, it’s been 2 weeks since I’ve put up anything new. Firstly, I’ve been very busy in my day job. I’ve been bringing work home at night and doing all the stuff you tell yourself you’re not going to do, which has affected my blogging. Secondly, and more crucially, I’ve had to lie in a darkened room for most of the past fortnight after hearing the latest records by 2 tribute acts being played to death on BBC 6 Music every hour of the day.

I am referring of course to the latest singles by Black Kids and the Shout Out Louds. Two perfectly acceptable, inoffensive wee indie pop bands. Well, they would be acceptable and inoffensive if they didn’t wear their Cure influences so brazenly on their cap sleeves. Talent borrows, genius steals, but this pair rip off their favourite band’s vocal style, scrubbed nylon-stringed acoustic guitar, synthetic trumpet stabs and keyboards so much it’s quite incredible Robert Smith hasn’t put on his best crumpled suit and hi-top trainers and marched them off to the local plagiarism court for a good dose of how the fuck did you think you could get away with that? Ok. Ripping off other artists is nothing new. What goes around comes around and all that, but really. Really! These records are quite incredible. Black Kids have recently been given a shiny make over by Bernard Butler but they still sound like the Cure. Here‘s the original lo-fi version of ‘Im Not Going To Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You’. It still sounds like the Cure. “You are the girl…..” the singer whines at the start and you think, “Hey! Where have I heard that before?” And by the time the chorus has kicked in it’s all too clear. The remix isn’t bad, mind. The Cure mixed by Daft Punk, but not bad.

Shout Out Louds are clearly in thrall to mid-80s Cure. ‘Tonight I Have To Leave It’ sounds like a 2 Many DJs mash-up of ‘In-Between Days’ and ‘Just Like Heaven’. Actually, I quite like this record. But don’t tell anyone. Compare and contrast with The Cure’s original (vocal-free) studio demo of ‘Just Like Heaven’ and an acoustic re-recording of ‘In-Between Days’. See what I mean?

At least J Mascis is an honest fellow. He liked ‘Just Like Heaven’ so much he recorded it and put it out on sexy green vinyl 7″. And he was honest enough to admit he didn’t know how to play the end of the record, so Dinosaur Jr‘s version just. Stops. Like that. It’s noisy and there’s a funny kind of wah-wah feedback effect playing in the background. There’s the odd scary bit too. You’ll like it. Here’s another scary bit………

If J Mascis cut his hair, he couldn’t half pass for Radio Clyde’s Billy ‘I Can Exclusively Reveal’ Sloan. No?

Cover Versions, Peel Sessions

Brand new, you’re retro

April 18, 2008April 20, 2008 Craig McAllister

I’m quite enjoying The Last Shadow Puppets single just now. ‘The Age of the Understatement’ isn’t quite the lost track from ‘Scott 4’ that the band would like it to be, but it twangs in all the right places and rushes past like Morricone beating The Coral to the finish line in the 100m sprint. There’s even a nice whiff of the Electric Prunes in the string arrangements.

Even better to these ears is their cover of David Bowie‘s ‘In The Heat Of The Morning’. Originally recorded for Deram back in the 60s, this is one of the lesser-well known gems in the Bowie catalogue. All strings and weird chords, in the scheme of things it falls somewhere between ‘Space Oddity’ and ‘Wild Eyed Boy From Freecloud’. You could be forgiven for thinking that The Last Shadow Puppets based their entire sound around this record, cos it sure sounds like it. But in a good way. Bowie likes it too. “That’s wonderful,” he said. “A daymaker.” Go on…make your day….

*The Last Shadow Puppets – ‘In The Heat Of The Morning’

*David Bowie – ‘In The Heat Of The Morning’ (Deram Records original release)

David Bowie – ‘In The Heat Of The Morning’ (John Peel’s Top Gear BBC Session, broadcast Christmas Eve, 1967, features Tony Visconti and T.Rex’s Steve Peregrine-Took on backing vocals)

Today’s blog has been half-arsed and lazy. Better quality blogging will resume as normal next week.

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find

‘Just Dropped In…’ quadruple-whammy

March 25, 2008March 25, 2008 Craig McAllister

‘I Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In)‘ was Kenny Rogers‘ second single with his group The First Edition. It made the US Billboard Top 10 in 1968 and rode the crest of the psychedelic wave that was sweeping the music world at the time – “I tripped over a cloud and fell 8 miles high, tore my mind on the jagged sky.” Like, wow, man. The intro has backwards guitars, the solo is played by Glen Campbell (is there anything he didn’t play on in the 60s?) and the drums were played by Mickey Jones, well known to Dylan afficianados as the drummer who couldnae hack it on Dylan’s 1966 world tour with the Hawks.

Nice trousers.

So. Great pedigree. And a great song. About as far removed from ‘Islands In The Stream’, ‘The Gambler’ or ‘Coward Of The County’ as you could possibly hope for. Indeed, Jimi Hendrix called ‘Just Dropped In…‘ his favourite song ever. I wish Jimi had done a version. You just know it it would’ve sounded brilliant. I bet Jerry lee Lewis‘ version sounds the business as well. Too bad he canned it as soon as he recorded it. Or did he? No amount of poking about cyberspace has unearthed it for me, but maybe you’ve got a version knocking about somewhere. Over to you…

No funny comment here.

In the meantime, here’s 3 covers. All different, all fantastic. Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings recorded their version as a tribute to the sounds of late 60s Stax and Motown. It sounds like Lynn Collins or one of those James Brown Funky People women singers he often produced. You can see the video for it (don’t think it’s official but it’s great) over on YouTube where the grainy, fuzzy footage is supposed to look like an old VHS taped copy of Soul Train. I thought Sharon Jones had come up with a really great idea for an original cover until I found out that Bettye Lavette had covered the self same track in 1968. I bet Bettye’s sounds just like it (I’m off to seek it out) but I do like Sharon Jones’ attempt. This version has only been released on dead-hard-to-get 7″ (try eBay), but I’ve got one. And now you do too.

They were young, they ran free, they grew old gracefulleee…

Supergrass put their version on the b-side of the double a sided ‘Alright/Time’ single. So lots of people will own this, but many people may not even have played it, given that anyone who bought ‘Alright’ played it on repeat for the whole summer of 1995 and then never wanted to hear it again. Which is a shame, cos ‘Time‘ is a cracker’, and ‘Condition‘ (as their version is called) sounds just like a Supergrass track from the ‘I Should Coco’ era. Which it is, funnily enough. Here it is.

Scuffed, battered and full of character. Just like his face.

I’ve left possibly the best version till last. Like Kenny Rogers, Willie Nelson is considered a country singer, but his version of ‘…Condition…‘ is not really country per-se. It’s laid back, soulful and has an intro that is absolutely ripe for sampling. If Sharon Jones’ cover is the Saturday night version then Willie Nelson’s is the Sunday morning hangover cure. You can find it on his ‘Rainbow Connection’ album from 2001. Or get it here.

Cover Versions, entire show, Hard-to-find

Well! Move over Rick Wakeman……….

January 23, 2008 Craig McAllister

……..Teenage Fanclub are back in town. And to celebrate my first gig of 2008 this Saturday in Glasgow, or for those of you who’ll see them before me in London (that’s just the warm-up by the way. Glasgow’s always Miles Better), here‘s a fantastic radio session they did for Mark Radcliffe’s Radio 1 show.

Broadcast on 1st June 1995 it was aired probably to promote the ‘Grand Prix’ album, although in Teenage Fanclub land I doubt if anything is so slickly planned. Still, if the session didn’t help the band shift an extra million or so copies of what was their finest album to date (and may still be?) then there really is no hope for any of us. The session’s a belter. It is choc full of funny anecdotes, bum notes and a general bonhomie between Mark Radcliffe and the band. I considered posting it as mp3’s. Due to boring reasons posting mp3’s as oppossed to larger files somehow brings more people to this site (something to do with search engines) and then I thought, well, you need to hear all of this session. The music is almost secondary to the inbetween bits. Full tracklisting is:

1. The OMD Drum Machine

2. Verisimilitude

3. Move Over Rick Wakeman

4. Songwriting Duties

5. Going Places

6. Norman’s Beard Permutations

7. Feel A Whole Lot Better

8. Why didn’t Gerry Sing It?

9. China Girl

10. Norman’s Maraca Frenzy

11. Starsign

12. Finding out everyone’s starsign

Happy downloading.

Please feel free to leave comments in the box. Cheers.

Mark Radcliffe in a pub. I’d buy him a pint.

Cover Versions, Gone but not forgotten, Hard-to-find

50 Million Elliott Smith Fans Can’t Be Wrong

January 13, 2008May 25, 2012 Craig McAllister

Well. Not quite 50 million. More like 50. I liked the Elvis-style photo below, hence the title. But in an ideal world more people would know about the music of Elliott Smith. He’s been dead for 3 and a half years, so if this post helps you get into him, great, but don’t expect him to be visiting your local open mic night anytime soon. Just make sure you get over to the Domino Records website for his earlier and later releases and Amazon or Play for his mid-period major label stuff. If you’re new to Elliott Smith I’d go for ‘XO’. That’s the album I discovered him through.

He is a truly great artist. A songwriter’s songwriter for sure. I bet Elton John loves him (though that’s no indication of what Elliott’s records sound like). His singing and guitar playing is absolutely fantastic. He plays all the weird chords, all the fanciest picking arrangements and if you’ve ever tried to learn any of his songs you’ll know how quickly they tie your fingers in knots. I’ve looked at all his press shots. I’ve yet to determine if he has 6 fingers on each hand, but it sure sounds like it. His vocals always sound brilliant. Like his hero John Lennon, they tend to be double-tracked. But whereas Lennon was a shouter (‘Help!’, ‘Revolution’ etc etc, take your pick), Elliot is more introverted. His ‘whispered, spider-web thin delivery’ (as one early reviewer referred to it) is understated melancholoy at its best. Elliott’s frequent battles with depression, drug addiction and alcoholism means that the subject matter can sometimes be dark, but the overall sound is just brilliant. In 1996, his song ‘Miss Misery’ was nominated for an Oscar, and Elliott performed it at the Academy Awards ceremony (it seems to have disappeared from YouTube). Unfortunately or otherwise, 1996 was the year of ‘Titanic‘ and Elliot was pipped at the post by Celine Dion.

When he died he was working on the the songs that would form ‘From A Basement On The Hill’. It was released after his death to no fanfares, fireworks or frenzied reviews. But those of us in the know lapped it up. Last year, ‘New Moon’, an album of demos and outtakes recorded around the time of his 3rd album (‘Either Or’) was released. You can hear one of the tracks here. Below, you’ll find a selection of demos, outtakes and b-sides from throughout his career. This is as good an introduction to Elliott Smith as you need. Happy downloading!

Say Yes (studio version)

Bottle Up & Explode (‘Either Or’-era demo, released on ‘XO’)

Punch & Judy (‘Either Or’-era demo)

Alameda (‘Either Or’-era demo)

Miss Misery (piano version)

Bled White (Jackpot Studios demo. Original version on ‘XO’)

Happiness (acoustic version. Original version on ‘Figure 8’)

Son Of Sam (acoustic version. Original version on ‘Figure 8’)

Figure 8 (title track, dropped from album)

Concrete Jungle (Bob Marley cover)

This is an excellent site where some of my recordings came from.

Cover Versions, Hard-to-find

The inaugural Plain Or Pan Christmas Compilation

December 20, 2007December 20, 2007 Craig McAllister

EVERY blog in the universe posts a Christmas compilation. It’s the law. Some are good, some are bad. Some are random. Some are themed. I found a reggae Christmas one last year. Reverend Frost’s Blog Spot usually has a good psych one (although this year I think he’s offline – click the Spread The Good Word link below left to check). No doubt Doctor Mooney will be doing one, and I’m sure there’ll be some good soul-related stuff over at Fufu Stew and the Funky 16 Corners. Even Diddy Wah does a good one (although he won’t link my site to his). They’re all different, all unique. And so is this wee compilation. Let’s hear it for the inaugural Plain Or Pan Christmas Compilation. Not available on iTunes, Amazon or Play. Only available here.

CD artwork here

Approach it the way you would approach opening your stocking on Christmas day. Share the delight at receiving the stuff you really need – Chuck Berry‘s ‘Run Rudolph Run’, the Arcade Fire‘s ‘Jinglebell Rock’, Half Man Half Biscuit‘s ‘All I Want For Christmas Is A Dupla Prague Away Kit’.

Greet the old favourites with a wry smile – Elvis‘s ‘Santa Claus Is Back In Town’, Bowie ‘n’ Bing doing ‘Little Drummer Boy’, ‘Let It Snow’ sung in a traditional (and somewhat camp) style by Candie Payne.

Jump up and down with joy at the stuff you get that you didn’t know you needed – A 50’s doo-wop ode to spending Christmas in the cells? That’ll be The Youngsters doing ‘Christmas In Jail’. Not forgetting Dandy Warhols ‘Little Drummer Boy’, U2‘s version of ‘Christmas (Please Come Home)’, Teenage Fanclub doing Big Star’s ‘Jesus Christ’ as well as their own (very rare) ‘Christmas Eve’ and John Lee Hooker‘s ‘Blues For Christmas’.

Of course there may be a copious amount of plain crap that you might want to throw in the bin straight away. I’ll leave that for you to decide.

If anyone wants The Beatles Fan Club Christmas Records (cos that’s de rigeur on blogs everywhere at this time of year), and you can’t find them anywhere, post a message and I’ll have them up for downloading quicker than Santa comes down yer chimney.

Happy Christmas everybody!

Cover Versions

Never trust a hippy

December 14, 2007December 14, 2007 Craig McAllister

Neil Young. He’s a cunt. He hasn’t played these shores in 5 or 6 years, but he’s back next year for a few shows. Well. 3 shows. If you have a spare £65 you could go. Except now you need about £150 for an eBay ticket cos all the tickets have sold out. Either I have morals or I’ve missed the boat. Morals first. There’s no way I’m paying £65 to see Neil Young in 2008. This Neil Young maybe…

Or this one….

But this Neil Young……………….?

Nah. I don’t think so.

Did I miss the boat? A few early risers got it. Order the tickets. Have no intention of going. Pop them on eBay for £250 a pair. Maybe I should have done likewise. Made a tidy wee profit and paid for Christmas. Either way, Neil’s made a tidy wee profit too. How come it cost £25 to see him last time around, yet the very next show he plays in Scotland will cost you almost 3 times that? Never trust a hippy. Especially one with a big ranch and a healthy bank balance. Rant over. Enjoy the music..

Supergrass ‘The Loner’.

Heavy on the hammond. Heaven on the ears.

Cover Versions

They say that Gedge fella’s a nice mutha***** – shut your mouth! You’re damn right!

December 6, 2007November 11, 2017 Craig McAllister

Back in 1989 I wrote a letter to The Wedding Present wishing them luck with their new major label contract. They’d just signed to RCA and lots of folk like the NME and my pals thought they’d sold out. I was helping collate a fanzine on the local music scene (which was very healthy at the time) and in the letter I asked if any of the Wedding Present could give any of us new bands some advice.

David Gedge wrote me a nice letter back, thanking me for my kind words and he invited me down to Leeds to interview the band in their favourite pub. I was only about 18 at the time and this was easily the best thing that had ever happened to me. It was like ‘Jim’ll Fix It’ and Christmas Day all at once. In February my Dad drove me to Leeds (I know, I know…) and dropped me off at the Red Lion pub (I think it was) I walked in and immediatley saw Pete the guitarist playing the fruit machine. Pete would later form The Ukranians but in those days he was known as Grapper, lead guitarist with The Wedding Present. He introduced me to David Gedge and a pal of his, and for the next couple of hours we talked about music, football and the usual sort of stuff while my wee dictaphone recorded the whole thing for posterity. Pete told me about the band’s first ever gig in a hall in Allerton Bywater (apologies for the spelling?) outside of Leeds. Years later I was travelling to York on the train and I went past Allerton Bywater. True that. David told me that he’d spent his part of the band’s advance from RCA on a Ford Orion. A red one. Can you imagine having this sort of conversation with any other band? Maybe Teenage Fanclub. Being English they all wanted to know what I thought of the Poll Tax (being tried out in Scotland at the time) but I was more interested in finding out what kind of guitars, amps and effects pedals the Wedding Present used to get their sound.

I was surprised to find out they were massive hip-hop fans. Gedge loved Public Enemy more than Sonic Youth. Naively I assumed that if you played in a guitar band you’d only like guitar music. I now know differently but I was a bit wet behind the ears back then. They were funny, kind and exactly the sort of people who you’d want to be friends with, and for a while I kind of was – David Gedge sent me a postcard from Germany when the band were on tour, the same week that the NME ran a big feature on the same tour. For the next few years, at the start of a new tour David would write to me and let me know that I was on their guest list when they were in Glasgow. Being 18/19, I took all of this a bit for granted. In hindsight I realise that not everyone got this sort of treatment from their favourite bands. David Gedge made a big impression on me and I vowed that when I got famous I’d be as nice to my fans as he had been to me.

Well. I’m still not famous, but I like being nice to you. In 1992, The Wedding Present came up with the brilliant idea of releasing a single per month. With fan based sales and a good promotional campaign from their major label, they’d be guaranteed a hit single every month and a place in the Guiness Book of Records. Each single was released on 7″. I have them all apart from the first one cos Our Price didn’t get any in. The idiots. Every A-side was a one-off original song and every B-side was a cover. Here below are 3 of the covers.

I could have gone for any of the 12 covers really. There’s a cracking version of the Go-Between’s ‘Cattle & Kane’ on the first single. They do a gnarly version of The Monkees ‘Pleasant Valley Sundae’. And their version of Elton John’s ‘Step Into Christmas’ will be posted very soon with my forthcoming Christmas Compilation post. Until then, here’s 3 excellent covers:

Neil Young‘s ‘Don’t Cry No Tears’

Isaac Hayes‘ ‘Theme From Shaft’

Bow Wow Wow‘s ‘Wild InThe Country’

oh go on then…………..4 covers…………..

Julee Cruise‘s ‘Falling‘ (Twin Peaks theme)

My favourite one’s the ‘Theme From Shaft’. Damn right! Happy listening

The nicest pop star I know

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals:

Tell yer pals: