6 Obscure Cover Songs You Need To Hear, Volume II (a Tune Musings Special)
Tune Musings is a regular series where a lifelong audiophile shares, dissects, and reviews lesser-known, beautiful music.
My first article showcasing lesser-known cover songs received such an enthusiastic response from readers (thank you for the eyeballs!) I decided to give the audience a little more of what they wanted. Here are another six unusual cover versions of popular songs that you might not have heard. Rock on.
“Raspberry Beret” — Hindu Love Gods (1990) — Prince cover
It’s difficult to imagine anyone doing Prince better than The Artist himself—and I will not pretend to equate the musicianship of the members of Hindu Love Gods with the late Purple One’s seemingly bottomless wealth of talent.
Prince’s “Raspberry Beret” is one of his breeziest and best 80s singles to me. But the Hindu Love Gods here accomplished that rare feat of making a timeless pop classic their own. So who the hell were the Hindu Love Gods? If you didn’t already recognize most of the goofy-looking, floppy-haired lads from the picture above, the HLG were a one-off side project that can best be summed up in this simple computational equation:
R.E.M. — Michael Stipe + Warren Zevon = Hindu Love Gods
Sort of an alt-rock meets literate/cerebral rock supergroup. They only released one proper LP in 1990, a self-titled collection of mostly blues covers. Their version of “Raspberry Beret” is a hard thumping blast of studio merriment, propelled by Bill Berry’s muscular drums and Peter Buck’s power chord crunches.
Zevon, clearly enjoying his time garage rockin’ with 3/4 of REM, puts every ounce of energy into his performance and somehow manages to out-sing Prince on this one.
“Lola” — The Raincoats (1979) — Kinks cover
I was not exactly sure if I should include this track. Not because the cover isn’t off-kilter enough (it’s off-kilter in almost every way imaginable). Not because The Raincoats are a household name (in the UK anyway — most American music fans of a certain age might remember the Raincoats simply as one of Kurt Cobain’s favorite bands).
No, I hesitated mainly because I have heard this version of the Kinks 1969 hit played several times in various supermarkets and restaurants recently. And I don’t know why or how. “Is Acme really playing….Lola…….by the Raincoats,” I’d ask myself while placing cans of cat food into my basket. Truly a peculiar phenomenon when indie and post-punk begin moonlighting as retail background muzak.
Regardless, listening to this version of Ray Davies’ tale of an almost romantic interlude with a possible trans woman is required.
Ana de Silva, Palmolive, Gina Birch, and Vicky Aspinall stunningly scramble and reconstitute every single molecule of “Lola” in the space of four minutes: there’s the rudimentary percussion, the time signature changes, the vocals are shared then un-shared…even the harmonies reach octaves the Kinks could have never imagined.
It’s a captivating and cheeky re-calibration of a deathless classic.
“Paint it Black” — Africa (1968) — Rolling Stones Cover
In 1968 famed record producer Lou Adler entered the studio with five young musicians, most of them former members of the LA doo-wop group the Valiants. The subsequent LP they created, Music From ‘Lil Brown,’ defies any and all classification.
Filled with incredible Latin-tinged funkified soul covers of famous pop hits, Music From ‘Lil Brown’ remains one of the music business’ strangest unheard gems.
Africa’s “Paint It Black” reduces the Jagger/Richards single to its bare bones, resurrecting the unmistakable riff with new life and pushing and pulling the whole affair to the breaking point.
In his review of the album, Max Kritzer describes Africa’s version of the Stones’ single: “Paint It Black” is stretched out with mostly wordless vocals and reverb-drenched conga percussion.”
Indeed, the relentless conga drumming galvanizes the entire 7:33 of the track. And the infectious “Na-na-na-na-na-na” sprinkled gingerly throughout the song infuses the cover with perfectly ripe enthusiasm.
This needs to be heard to be believed. I find it difficult to realize this brilliant LP has not been more widely shared and consumed.
“Take Me Home, Country Roads” — Whitney featuring Waxahatchee (2020) — John Denver cover
My father was a huge John Denver fan in the 80s, long after it was fashionable to be seen driving around blasting “Rocky Mountain High” from a car with the windows down (wait…was that ever fashionable??). He owned Denver’s almost entire discography on 8-track (look it up, kids). My dad even possessed the complete John Denver Guitar Songbook, utilized to torture my siblings and me with gruff, barely half-tempo renditions of “Annie’s Song” and “Leaving On A Jet Plane.”
Suffice it to say; that I did not grow up a JD fan. But I have evolved to appreciate the simple, straightforward beauty of the man’s best work. It was country/folk-pop at its most earnest and transparent. It’s a credit to John Denver’s legacy that his music is still being discovered and emulated by musicians today.
Which brings me to this cover, gorgeously performed by Chicago indie rock duo Whitney and Alabama-bred Waxahatchee. There is nothing extra special about this version aside from the vocalists' arresting harmonies on display here.
Rather, this cover of “Take Me Home, Country Roads” makes the list for one simple reason: it makes me want to listen to John Denver without having to listen to John Denver.
“Funkytown” — Pseudo Echo (1985) — Lipps, Inc cover
Please let me know in the comments below if you remember this cover. In a completely non-scientific poll I conducted of same-aged individuals, only a handful of music lovers I grew up with recall this version of “Funkytown” becoming a minor American radio attraction in the mid-80s.
I remember loving the Australian new-wavers’ rendition of the disco hit as a kid, but I had completely forgotten about it until two years ago. But wow-hearing it now is like speeding through a one-song crash course in over-indulgence, 80s style. The synths? TASTY and SYNTHY! The guitar freakouts? TOTALLY RADICAL! The singing? GNARLY!
I was accidentally re-acquainted with this goofy over the top take on “Funkytown” back in 2020 amidst the anxious early days of the pandemic. Perhaps due to the flood of comforting memories it invoked, Pseudo Echo’s cover quickly became a heavy lockdown rotation favorite.
“Everybody’s Coming To My House” — The Detroit School of Arts Jazz Ensemble Choir (2018) — David Byrne cover
It’s one thing for a group of musicians to simply cover another artist’s creation. I believe that is commonly referred to as flattery. But what do you dub those rare instances when a cover version of a song outright blows away the original songwriter/performer?
I’d say that’s reverence.
“Everybody’s Coming To My House,” as written and performed by David Byrne in 2018, is a tension-packed track revolving around the singer’s desire for solitude and emotional distance in the face of life’s constant frictions. When Byrne wails in the chorus, “Everybody’s coming to my house, and I’m never gonna be alone,” you can clearly hear the fearful hesitation in his voice. Within the context of his lyrics, Byrne is really saying, “I don’t want everyone at my house…why won’t (people) leave me alone”.
In the voices of the young students of the Detroit School of Arts’ Jazz Ensemble, with music re-arranged by their teacher Cheryl Valentine, the meaning and vibe of “Everybody’s Coming To My House” is flipped entirely on its head.
Listen and watch as these kids inject Byrne’s composition with optimism and shared hope. Through their eyes, the refrain transforms from one of exclusion to “everybody is coming to our house, and I’m so thankful I will never be alone.”
Byrne himself was floored when he heard this version:
“When I saw what the DSA students did with my song, it completely changed the way I thought of it. In fact, it changed the meaning of the song — I realized it was about inclusion, welcoming, and not being alone. It’s a more generous interpretation of the song than what I do with my voice. We are all in the same house — if we want to be. Just goes to show how a song can change (radically!) depending on who is singing it.”
The students experience of “Everybody’s Coming To My House” is likewise memorable:
“American Utopia? Maybe it means … togetherness? Like a group effort? We’re just all in this thing together, and we just need to know that,” said Michael Brown a twelfth grade vocal major. However, when the project it began it wasn’t so easy: “When I first heard it… I literally said, um Miss V…. what are we supposed to do with this?!”, explained eleventh grader vocal majors Ivon Harris & Katarina Johnson. Their classmate Justin Malone continued, “Half of us were like, “Oh…this song is okay.” And then a quarter of us were like “…OMG who did this?!” And then we actually read the sheet music, and did it, it felt like a moment of togetherness.”
Their performance's video (below) is as important to the message as the audio. Enjoy:
