Muse’s cover of Nina Simone’s “Feeling Good” took top honors in a cover song poll conducted by music magazine NME. And while it’s a great cover (see episode 546), I wonder whether it would top the list in, say, 5 years, while runners up “Twist & Shout” and “Hey Joe”, long-time favorites, might hold steady.
Your thoughts?
By the way, thanks to the insistence of Veronica Belmont, a Muse Cover Story is in the works!
I always bugs me when poll results like this come out. Readers, en masse, have very short-term memories. When I hear about a story like this, I can only think “if I were running this poll, I’d throw out any votes for songs from the last three to five years.” There might be some great covers in those years, but we need to let them stew a while in the public consciousness before we can allow them into the conversation of “best of all time.”
BTW, I love that there’s a Limp Bizkit song on the “Worst 10,” though I think #11 should be Fred Durst’s “Behind Blue Eyes.” It cracks me up to this day that he misspelled Pete Townshend’s name in the liner notes.
They were interviewing this guy today from the radio in Oxfordshire who hosts a music show and releases occasional covers compilations for charity. Anyway, it was obvious this guy had no idea what makes a good cover, but he did offer a personal selection that had some credibility – Last Town Chorus with their great Modern Love. I was shouting at the radio that they needed to get Brian on the show to explain what makes a great cover.
Let’s not forget though that,
a) Most NME readers wouldn’t know what a cover was, never mind name any.
b) By and large, most people have no interest in covers
Polls… 🙂
What, no Stranglers? This list is so pedestrian. There are some good covers there but the best ever? no way. Coverville should do a poll asking everyone their top 5. that would be a list to see!
Yeah, I agree with everyone. Favourite covers are highly subjective. Considering everyone comes into contact with different songs due to different demographics, and how they affect the people that hear them, not to mention the different styles of music people like, well, it stands to reason that people would have different ideas of what the best covers are. I think a list from Canada, the U.S or even the UK would all look very different.
I replaced 4 of those songs in the best list within seconds of thinking about it. It’s true that time needs to be allowed to pass on the new tracks to make sure they last. Yes it’s subjective, and I am a HUGE Marvin Gaye fan, but Grapevine? CCR’s cover is better. There are dozens if not hundreds of better versions of Feeling Good, many of which get recovered on American Idol every flippin’ year. And I know I’m in the minority on this one, but there really isn’t a good version of Hallelujah…IMHO the most overcovered overrated song ever put on the air.
The Beatles’ version of ‘Twist and Shout’ and Marvin Gaye’s version of ‘I Heard It through the Grapevine’ are covers, and in any case, those versions might as well be the originals, since anything else is going to be a variation on what we’re used to hearing. I agree with Matt above – anything from the last 3-5 years should be tossed out – I doubt Muse will be getting airplay 50 years from now. (And that’s not a slam against Muse – I like ‘Feeling Good’ and some of their other stuff – I just don’t think they’re in that ‘timeless’ category.)
I always consider great covers when the original is eclipsed. Gaye’s (admitedly overplayed) Grapevine was so popular that people asked Gladys Knight (the originator) why she was doing a M Gaye song. Both Trent Reznor (Johnny Cash’s Hurt) and Wilson Pickett (Aretha’s Respect, which belongs on the list) have acknowledged the cover has eclipsed their original. My Hendrix pick would be Watchtower, which influenced how Dylan himself performed it.
I agree: Brian, you need to do a poll, different criteria than your end of year poll, of the GREATEST covers ever.
An interesting way to do a poll would be to do it by country and see how much of a difference we get.
Ohhh Muse cover story! Love it! Waiting patiently by my computer for it…..
I agree with Roger. Unless the cover surpasses the original, it can’t even be considered as one of the greatest ever. Muse’s cover of Feeling Good is brilliant, but it’s not better than Nina’s original.
I can’t speak from a “Feelin Good” standpoint, but from a Muse standpoint I think the cover is amazingly well done. I want to make an argument like “the cover is almost 10 years old – it is off of 2001 Origin of Symmetry”, but I know it’s really not relevant since many folks (especially readers of the magazine) didn’t know about muse until 1-3 years ago when they blew up in the US.
I do agree in general that many top X lists give more credit than they should newer songs that are at the moment big in public conscience.
Veronica is a Smashing Pumpkins fan and also is making you do a Muse cover story? music-five *high-five sound*