Cover... Version?!?!

The subject of cover vs. version was first brought to my attention while listening to the Radioactive Metal podcast with Roch and Snowy. Until the subject had been broached, I had never put much thought into what separates the two different categories. This particular subject caught my attention because I love cover songs, and I have found several new bands and artists that grabbed my attention through their covers of another artists song. Sometimes the discovery was a song that I was familiar with already, and a new band caught my attention with their particular rendition of that song. Other times it was a band that I was already a fan of doing a cover of an as-yet-unknown-to-me artist that got me prowling for new music. There have been a few times when I have been listening to a particular song by an artist and thinking that something in the song was not quite right and needed to be changed, be it the general attitude of the song, the lyrical delivery, the guitar solo's or tones or just brought up to date with better production. Whether the version was recorded as an homage to a previous artist, a mock-documentary, or recorded just for fun, different covers of songs are generally fun to listen to but a well done cover is few and far between.

A version of a song usually happens when one of the original artists or writer of the song is involved in the recording process. These songs are usually found on B-side singles, remixes, tribute albums and so on. For instance, the version of N.I.B. by Black Sabbath that was recorded by Primus with Ozzy on vocals was different than the original and definitely better. The music was changed slightly but the song kept it's own identity. Then there is the case of Paul DiAnno, former lead singer for Iron Maiden who continues to tour and plays songs that he sung with them live and re-records them over and over again. In the case of Dallas, TX punk band, One Bad Pig, they recorded a punk version of Petra's Judas Kiss with Bob Hartman doing the guitar work. OBP also entered the studio with the legendary Johnny Cash and recorded a duet with him in the form of Man In Black. While all these are examples of a version of a song, no two are alike and each version reflects the band as a whole.

 A different way to look at a version is Christmas music, hymns and traditional songs. Most people already know the lyrics and melody by heart and can identify these songs in a matter of seconds. I personally have 2 different versions of Amazing Grace as recorded by Flatfoot 56 and the Dropkick Murphys. Both of these versions are celtic punk with bagpipes carrying the melody, but both versions are far different. The Dropkick Murphys are also known for their punked-up covers of traditional Irish music and they have gained the respect of fans both young and old for giving new life to these classic songs. Be it punk, metal, pop, easy listening, rock, country, R&B, or another style, what the songs have in common is their easily identifiable melody and lyrics, as well as the appeal to the masses.

What separates good covers from the lifeless and mundane covers is the amount of originality that the recording artist puts in to the song, the style chosen and the originality that the covering artist maintains. Some covers, however, should never have been recorded in the first place. No Quarter by Led Zeppelin was covered by Tool. This cover was absolutely horrendous and unlistenable. There was nothing of the original song left intact. Had it been recorded with a different name, it might have been passed over all together. The banner-waving, flag-flying godfathers of metal, Judas Priest recorded a cover of Chuck Berry's Johnny B. Goode that is so bad it qualifies as a must-listen for the humor factor alone. The lyrics and the intro riff are left intact, but the original attitude and rock n' roll swagger has been produced and played right out of the song. Judas Priest have absolutely nailed covers in the past, most notably with Joan Baez's Diamonds & Rust. Judas Priest made this song uniquely their own and yet it is still respectful to the original artist and maintains the attitude and emotion of the original version. This song has become a Priest standard and few people even realize that is a cover.  Then there are the covers that are so bad they must be mentioned individually. These include Poison's cover of the Kiss anthem, Rock n' Roll All Nite, Winger's cover of Purple Haze, Alice Cooper's cover of Fire by Hendrix, and the Bronx Casket Co's cover of Free Bird. Unfortunately, the list goes on and on.

A great cover keeps the original song intact, thereby paying respect to the original artist, but the covering band must maintain their identity as well. It is a fine line to walk and a balancing act to be sure for the covering band to make the song their own without trashing the original artist or song. When Blackie Lawless recorded his cover of Chuck Berry's Promised Land, he gave song an injection of testosterone with a punk flavor but still kept the attitude and melody intact while creating a song that is pure W.A.S.P.. The Dropkick Murphys recorded a cover of CCR's Fortunate Son and created what is in my opinion, cover perfection. While I love CCR and I love the song Fortunate Son, I thought that it lacked some of that brashness and cocky strut that it could have had. You distort the guitars a little more for that raw buzzsaw sound, speed up the tempo, and add some gang vocals for effect. When I heard DKM's cover of this song, my jaw hit the floor, they had nailed exactly what I had wanted to hear that song become.

When Social Distortion covered Johnny Cash's Ring Of Fire they changed the song to fit the band, rather than changing the band for the song. This key is crucial to a good cover. Mike Ness, Social Distortion's frontman and main songwriter, also recorded an album of old country tunes but he changed the songs just enough to fit his vocal style, added some other guitar elements and changed tempo's to fit the attitude of the album and achieved one of the greatest  cover albums ever recorded. New Mexico thrashers Ultimatum also recorded an album of cover tunes. Their cover of Metallica's Creeping Death was changed and recorded in such a way as to make it familiar to fans of the original and yet it is still completely an Ultimatum song. Knowing when and what to change in a cover so that neither the original artist nor the covering band are compromised in their artistry and originality is crucial to the success of a song as a whole. Changing the song in just the right ways can allow for the song to take on a whole new life of it's own but changing it too much or not enough can doom the song to be compared to the hordes of impotent, lifeless covers that have gone on before. 

the point of all this ranting and raving is this, not every band or artist can cover every song. and most songs can maintain the stamp of originality while being covered in another genre, but not all. Whether a song is an original, a cover or a version, the song must reflect the bands individuality, and the band cannot sacrifice their individuality for a single song or you end up with generic garbage that has no lasting effect.