Guilty Pleasure: Cover Songs

I was never the biggest fan of Nine Inch Nails, but...

I really love me some cover songs.  I can't say that

 they are better than the originals, but more so the "new" artist's take on a song we are probably familiar with.  This past fall, I discovered Emerson Nogueira.  He is a cover artist extraordinaire. What is absolutley amazing is that here's this Brazilian musician with a very thick accent selling over 1 million records covering English songs.

Is he good?  That's the crux of the entire cover song argument.  There are those that contend that a cover song is never as good as the original.  In a recent SPIN magazine article, Oasis member Noel Gallagher stated that "Ryan Adam's version [of "Wonderwall"] is so much better than ours, but we can't exactly go around sing his version can we?"  I think that caputures the idea behind covers.  They can be done out of respect for the artist covered.  Garth Brooks covered Billy Joel's "Shameless" and they both made a ton of money.  But is one better than the other?  

A few covers that I absolutely love:

1. Hallelujah - Leonard Cohen wrote this song for his 1984 album, but it wasn't until I heard this song covered by Jeff Buckley during a season ending episode of West Wing did I fall in love with it.  Buckley rearranged a few of the lyrics, but the meaning and the emotion behind his version just stuck with me.  Cohen's version, again the original, is quite nice, but comes across brighter than Buckley's; it's due to Cohen's voice.  Not bad or in any ways negative, just my preference.
2. Across the Universe - A beautiful song.  Period.  Having said that, this is the song that help me fall in love with Emerson Nogueira.  Nogueira's version does not even compare to The Beatles, but there is something homey and comforting about a thick Brazilian accent singing those Sanskrit lyrics.  
3. Message in a Bottle - Sting at some of his finest, this 1979 song by The Police is simply a classic one for me.  Stuart Copeland really struts his stuff and shows he does have serious chops on this track.  It's a bit of an agressive song filled with a passion, but John Mayer covered it a few years back during an acoustic set.  I actually got it by accident and fell in love.  Mayer does the song justice with his fingerwork and and singing.
4. Whiskey in the Jar - Apparently, this goes back than even I realized.  Made popular in the 1960s by the Dubliners, I was first introduced to this song through Thin Lizzy.  Didn't care much for the intro solo, but the song was/is good.  Of course, I got my rock fix and permantly have a copy of Metallica's version on hand.  James Hetfield really makes the lyrics work.  Maybe that's why they won a Grammy, but that doesn't mean too much.  The video is pretty kick ass as well.

So, even with this short list of covers, you can see that a great many artists do their inspiration justice.  That's not to say that there are covers that just plain suck.  Period.  Fleetwood Mac had a great song titled "Landslide".  A few years ago, the Dixie Chicks decided to cover it.  Women crooned about how good the song was.  Didn't do jack for me; I hated it.  Keith Whitley has a song titled "When You Say Nothing at All".  Great song, worked with Whitley's timbre.  Alison Krauss covered it a few years, and as her voice lacks a male voices depth, she never quite did it for me (at least with that song).  The Randy Rogers Band released a song a while back titled, "Sombody Take Me Home".  Kenny Chesney covered the song.  Chesney's version is good (his voice really works and the arrangement is quite nice), but something about it lacks when you've listened to the original.

In the end, I think that cover songs are a valuable commodity.  They offer an outlet for artists to pay homage to their inspirations, a way to voice somthing that perhaps was done well already, and simply a way to expand to other genres.  It's kind of like any other industry:  there are good things about it and bad things as well.  Musically, covers are a good thing.  There are those covers that just plain suck, but it doesn't cast a shadow on those covers that are well done and still hold a ton of meaning.

Closing quote?  Something a bit lighter...

"I'll play along with the charade.  That doesn't seem to be a reason to change.  You know I feel so dirty when they start talking cute, I wanna tell her that I love her but the point is probably moot." - as sung by Frickin' A (originally by Rick Springfield)