10+ Covers That Don't Suck

Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery. If we're lucky, the imitation is just as good or even better than the original. Look at a band such as the Grateful Dead...how many tunes did they play live that weren't their own? I vividly recall the band opening up the second set in Chicago (1994) with Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds, which was a very cool surprise.

Anyway, here are a few covers that definitely earn their keep, with original artists in parentheses. While these come to mind relatively quickly, but this is by no means meant to be an exhaustive list nor is it in any order whatsoever:

1. You Really Got Me, Van Halen (The Kinks). OK, how many of you kids were in middle school and played the crap out of Van Halen's first album either on vinyl or cassette so much the inferior media of the day eventually degraded into nothing? Yup, me too. Right after Eddie's classic guitar solo "Eruption" was the charged remake of a Kinks classic.
2. Friend of the Devil, Lyle Lovett (Grateful Dead). Deadicated was probably the first of the odd "tribute album" wave back in the mid-1990s and was recorded with proceeds to benefit the rainforests or something like that, a cause to which the Dead expended great efforts. Lovett's soulful country voice is a perfect match here.
3. Pretty Woman, Van Halen. (Roy Orbison). Admit it...you like this much better than Roy's original. Especially with the "Intruder" lead-in on Diver Down, which is over half cover tunes. Probably the first Van Halen tune that got widespread airplay in my little corner of Central New York in the early 1980s.
4. Gimme Some Lovin', Grateful Dead - Pittsburgh '89 (Spencer Davis Group, featuring Steve Winwood). Brent Mydland and his angst-ridden voice delivered some gems for the Dead back in his day, but this one slowly emerging out of Space is probably my favorite. Mickey and Bill's thundering drums introduce that signature wail of Brent's keyboards...and it is ON.
5. Dead Souls, Nine Inch Nails (Joy Division). From The Crow soundtrack. I heard this long before I heard the Joy Division original. OK, yeah, it's not the best thing Trent ever churned out (I enjoyed Burn from the Natural Born Killers soundtrack much more), but anything involving Nine Inch Nails and Joy Division belongs on this silly list of mine just because, dammit. Honestly, I liked NIN's version of Adam Ant's Physical (Track #98 on the Broken EP) a lot more.
6. Ain't Too Proud to Beg, The Rolling Stones (Temptations). Not the first nor the last time the Stones piggybacked off the Motown sound. This Temptations remake immediately precedes the title track on It's Only Rock 'n' Roll. Now Mick's voice sounds downright silly on occasion, but it works here with the piano and Keith's crooning bluesy guitar.
7. Never Let Me Down Again, Smashing Pumpkins (Depeche Mode). This cut led off the mid-1990s DM tribute disc Ultra. I heard it first on the radio while driving...probably on WHFS while driving on the Beltway and was a little confused, 'cause it sure as hell sounded like Billy Corgan was singing a DM tune. Indeed he was. It took a while to finally track this down in a pre-amazon.com era. Clearly the class of the disc, the Pumpkins sound is nice and trippy.
8. All Along the Watchtower, Grateful Dead-Buffalo '89 (Bob Dylan). Deep, DEEP into the second set of my first (of only four total, unfortunately) Dead show in the rain...uh, at least I think it was raining. Yeah...rain...that's it. Whatever the weather was, they nailed this one.
9. My Way, Sid Vicious (pretty sure you know damn well who did the original). Just kidding, but this disembodied, frantic mosh pit version of a classic was a fitting ending to the Good Fellas' portrayal of the spiraling load of shit that Henry Hill's life ultimately became.
10. Kerosene, Lowest of the Low (Bad Religion). The last track on the studio mini accompanying the live CD Nothing Short of a Bullet. I'm not sure if I've ever actually heard the original, but this rocks, so there ya have it. Big ups to Ron Hawkins, Stephen Stanley and the rest of the Low (didya hear? They're touring again: http://www.lowestofthelow.com/).
11. Bertha, Los Lobos (Grateful Dead). Another track from Deadicated. Really, they should have stopped tribute CDs right here. Actually, they should have wrapped up this one before its last track (see below). Los Lobos' Mexibilly sound fits like a glove for one of my Dead favorites (and the opener to the aforementioned Buffalo '89 show).
12. Overkill, Lazlo Bane (Men at Work). Just awesome. No, seriously. This is probably my favorite cover of all time. Much heavier than the irreverent poppy original. Goes at a more deliberate pace than the Men at Work version (tough not to - someone was definitely double-parked when they were laying that track down). Starts off quietly and slowly, then works its way up to a crescendo with a big-ass grungy edge...with Colin Hay topping off the last stanza. Excellent video, too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RqOU7r4hdmw

And now let's recognize a few tunes that should never been messed with (especially in this fashion) to begin with:

• It's My Life, Gwen Stefani (Talk Talk). Admittedly, I'm not a fan of her high-pitched, incessantly-droning voice, especially when I heard "Just a Girl" about 90 times a day when it first came out. This didn't help - the tune plays directly to her weaknesses and is annoying as hell. Seriously, why did this ever happen?
• Ripple, Jane's Addiction (Grateful Dead). The first time through this disc I was intrigued to see what Perry Farrell and the crew would do with this on the last track of the CD. Needless to say, I was quickly disappointed. This was a mess. Farrell's voice doesn't belong within 1,000 miles of this tune, and the instruments were a disjointed mess.
• Sweet Child of Mine, the woman in the Black-Eyed Peas at this year's Super Bowl halftime show (Guns 'n' Roses). Slash should have stayed home. This reached untraversed proportions of suckdom, even for the annual over-produced mega-letdown know as the Super Bowl halftime show.
• Anything on Covering the Bases by Bronson Arroyo. Maybe Theo traded Bronson away for the human window fan that was Wily Mo Pena 'cause he was sick of listening to the kid consistently butcher Stone Temple Pilots riffs in the clubhouse. That would be enough reason for me.