Playlist: Covers 8

Here we are with another playlist, and it's time to tap into the seemingly bottomless well of interesting and unusual cover versions. Ten more tunes - you might be familiar with some of these versions, but I'm guessing in a few cases, you may not even be aware of the original.

1. Weezer: Africa

Photo: NHL

While Africa may be considered by many to be a soft rock 'classic', few would have thought it coverable material for cool indie hipsters, Weezer, some 35 years later. Steve Lukather wasn't keen on the somewhat corny lyrics written by bandmate David Paich, saying he would run naked down Hollywood Boulevard if it became a hit! Coming off the back of US number two hit Rosanna, it went one better - not sure if he ever made that run? Some Weezer fans on Twitter were piling on pressure for them to do a cover version, and eventually, to troll them, the band recorded a version of Rosanna in 2017. But then, in May 2018, their version of Africa finally materialised, and when it made #59, it gave their first entry in the Hot 100 in nine years.

(live on Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve 2018/19)

2. The Replacements: Another Girl, Another Planet

When this was first released by The Only Ones in 1978, it was not a hit; it was only three years later, in June 1981, that crept to number 44... in the New Zealand charts! When it made legendary DJ John Peel's Festive Fifty in 1980, he referred to it as an "artful little caprice". The Replacements, one of America's finest post-punk bands, played it live on many occasions, and eventually put a typically ramshackle live version as the B-Side to 1989s Achin' To Be.

(audio only - live version, apparently taped at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, 1989)

3. The Fall: There's A Ghost In My House

Mark E. Smith was prodigious, both in the amount of music he cranked out, and also in the number of bandmates he got through during the 42 year contrary existence of The Fall. However, when he met and married a young American fan going by the name of Brix Smith, the style of his output changed a little. She opened him up to throw his 'distinctive' stylings to an ever so slightly more pop sensibility. This included a few cracking cover versions, including this - a Motown track by Holland-Dozier-Holland that was recorded by Canadian R. Dean Taylor. It hadn't been a hit until it was picked up in the Northern Soul clubs of England in the early 70s, eventually going Top 10 there. For The Fall, it would give them their first ever Top 40 track, reaching 30 in 1987.

(official music video)

4. Pavement: Camera

Perhaps only a band like Pavement could dare to do a version of an early R.E.M. classic like Camera. The song holds a special place in the R.E.M. canon, being a delicate and poignant ode to one of their friends (the photographer Carol Levy) who had died in a car crash. There was perhaps little point trying to recreate Michael Stipe's vocal from the original, because it had been so raw and open, so Stephen Malkmus chose (wisely) to mute and muddy his version. Pavement added it as a B-Side to what would become one of their signature songs, Cut Your Hair.

(official audio)

5. Drivin N Cryin: Leaving On A Jet Plane

When a young John Denver wrote Leaving On A Jet Plane at Washington National Airport in 1966, he probably didn't realise the longevity the tune would have. Before he would become known for it, it would provide Peter, Paul & Mary with their biggest hit, topping the Billboard chart in 1969. Kevin Kinney moved to Atlanta in 1985 and formed Drivin N Cryin, a much underrated rootsy southern rock band, and they would do a fantastic, and gritty / slightly punky, cover of this song for their self-titled seventh record in 1997.

(audio only)

6. 10,000 Maniacs: Dallas

I was going to use their version of Cat Stevens Peace Train, recorded for their brilliant second record, In My Tribe. But when I read into it and found out that they'd asked for it to be removed from further pressings, because of Stevens apparent support for the fatwa against Salman Rushdie in 1989, calling for his death - I revisited that option.

But rather than abandon the Maniacs, I have turned to this, a version of one of my favourite country-adjacent tunes. Dallas was by the occasional gathering of wonderful Texas musicians called The Flatlanders (Joe Ely, Jimmie Dale Gilmore and Butch Hancock), and this version is from Natalie Merchant's swansong appearance with the Maniacs for MTV Unplugged, where she was joined by none other than David Byrne.

(live on MTV Unplugged, 1993)

7. Jeff Buckley: Lilac Wine

Photo: Estate of David Gahr / Getty

Jeff Buckley was a once in a lifetime talent, and I don't think I can mention him without asking the eternal question of how much better would the world have been if we weren't robbed of him after just one studio album? Interestingly, for such a renowned and fantastic record, actually three of the ten songs on Grace are covers. Naturally, we tend to gravitate towards his definitive version of Cohen's Hallelujah, but this time we will consider the even more delicate Lilac Wine. It was composed by James Shelton in 1950 for the musical Dance Me A Song, a show that wasn't a hit and never even managed a cast recording of the tunes. The song is about being intoxicated by wine to get over the heartache of losing a lover. Despite its relative obscurity, it has been a popular one to cover, with Nina Simone, Eartha Kitt and Elkie Brooks among those to have recorded it. Writing in Rolling Stone, Stephanie Zacherek said of Buckley's version, that "his voice seems weighted down with tears that just won't come out in the normal way." For additional context, David Bowie, no stranger to writing great music himself, thought that Grace was the greatest album ever made.

(live in Chicago, 1995)

8. Peter Holsapple & Chris Stamey: Here Without You

When former dB's compadres Peter Holsapple and Chris Stamey reconvened in 1991 to work on their first album together in almost a decade, they produced the largely acoustic-led work, Mavericks. They penned eleven, delightful and engaging tunes themselves, and then rounded things off by covering Here Without You by The Byrds. Written by Gene Clark in 1965 for their debut record, Mr. Tambourine Man, it is a slowly measured, melancholic song about loneliness.

(decent fan shot live video, St Louis, 2009)

9. Pearl Jam: Baba O'Riley

This Who classic has been a staple of the Pearl Jam live set for many years, getting an airing as far back as 1992. The original, considered one of the best rock songs of the last 60 years by many, was penned by Pete Townshend for 1971s Who's Next, and was inspired by his favourite spiritualist, Meher Baba, and minimalist composer, Terry Riley. Pearl Jam have only ever put it on live records, never having a go at it in the studio though; you can find it on Live at the Garden from 2003 and Give Way from 1998.

(live at Madison Square Gardens, 2003 - featuring Steve Diggle of Buzzcocks)

10. Ike & Tina Turner: Proud Mary

Firstly, the original by CCR is fantastic, and this version may be even more so. Secondly, you have to consider Tina Turner's situation at the time she made her version; she had been working with, and married to, the undoubtedly musically talented Ike Turner for about 11 or 12 years. The problem was, he was a despicable human being, creating an abusive marriage and work life for Tina. A few years after this was recorded, she bravely left him, running away from a hotel they were staying at near Dallas (after he fell asleep) - and it's hard to believe the situation she was in, because this version is so full of belief and hope, and turns from slow burn into a funking classic.

(live on Beat Club, 1971 - all funking hell breaks loose from 2:30 in)