A Revolution in Sound
1. The Flaming Lips with Stardeath And White Dwarfs - Borderline (Madonna)
2. The Black Keys - Her Eyes Are A Blue Million Miles (Captain Beefheart)
3. Michelle Branch - A Case Of You (Joni Mitchell)
4. Against Me! - Here Comes A Regular (Replacements)
5. Missy Higgins - More Than This (Roxy Music)
6. James Otto - Into The Mystic (Van Morrison)
7. Adam Sandler - Like A Hurricane (Neil Young)
8. Taking Back Sunday - You Wreck Me (Tom Petty)
9. Mastodon with Billy Gibbons - Just Got Paid (ZZ Top)
10. The Used - Burning Down The House (Talking Heads)
11. Disturbed - Midlife Crisis (Faith No More)
Sweetheart: Our [that is, Starbucks'] Favorite Artists Cover Their Favorite Love Songs
1 Death Cab for Cutie - Love Song (Cure cover)
2 Katy Perry - Black and Gold (Sam Sparro cover)
3 DeVotchKa - Hot Burrito #1 (I'm Your Toy) (Flying Burrito Brothers cover)
4 Department of Eagles - Love Me (Elvis Presley cover)
5 Jessica Lea Mayfield - Words of Love (Buddy Holly cover)
6 Ben Bridwell - Your Love Is Forever (George Harrison cover)
7 Kate Tucker - I'm on Fire (Bruce Springsteen cover)
8 Rogue Wave - Maps (Yeah Yeah Yeahs cover)
9 A.C. Newman - Take on Me (a-ha cover)
10 Jem - Yellow (Coldplay cover)
11 Richard Hawley - Early Morning Rain (Gordon Lightfoot cover)
12 Daniel Martin Moore - I Hear Music (Billie Holiday cover)
13 She & Him - I Put a Spell on You (Screamin' Jay Hawkins cover)
14 Lila Downs - My One and Only Love (Frank Sinatra cover)
On first glance, I don't see any real connections between ANY of these artists and their source material, except for the organizing premises. In comments, Chris sez:
I'm wondering what you make of the cover genre to begin with. I can't help but think there's been a bigger shift in what cover songs do.... away from a citation of musical influence which showed both difference and continuity (e.g. the sheer number of R.E.M. VU covers... or the Go-Gos covering the Shangri-las) toward more of an "American pop repertoire" song book approach (as in American Idol).
This is in line with something I was saying back when Paul Anka put out his most recent covers album: "In a way, the straight-faced approach is what makes this album provocative. While Anka’s brand of interpretation makes for a few embarrassing missteps (a swing cover of 'Tears in Heaven' strikes me as particularly cheap, especially given the song’s well-known back story), it also helps to recontextualize a few ubiquitous 80s and 90s tracks as 'standards.'"
Thing is, I'm finding a hard time finding covers these days that aren't straight-faced. Emo bands have been helpful -- they'll cover just about anything with zero hint of irony, from Britney to Lil' Wayne. I like this trend; it's maybe one writ-large effect of so-called popism that privileges the basic value of pop production without necessarily accepting pop's legitimacy wholesale (h/t Tom). And I'm guessing that as indie/mainstream antagonisms continue to diminish by default as everything shrinks, we'll continue to get a back and forth between the mainstream and semi-mainstream and quasi-mainstream...not sure what this will look like, but perhaps the Prince cover of "Creep" is an early indicator of a (not institutionally, but at least conceptually) leveled playing field.
In a weird related note, I had a dream last night that I was watching the Grammys (which I did not actually watch) and Toby Keith was getting ready to play a song, but first got in a dig at Taylor Swift, singing "Love Story" in a sarcastic falsetto. His message was (1) that she wasn't really country and (2) she couldn't really sing. Then he attacked Miley Cyrus for exposing her midriff. BUT! Then he sang what sounded like a Neil Young song sung by Nick Cave or something. It was pretty good! It wasn't one of his, and in the dream I identified it as Bruce Springsteen, to which someone in the room said I was crazy. Wish I remembered how it went.
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