Archive for the 'Covers' Category

Community Service Announcement
Kylie Auldist
Just Say, 2008

The Australian soul singer that I was intrigued by on this song that I posted in November released her debut album May 26 on Tru Thoughts (the same label that released the Bamboos album that she guested on). Her album was produced Lance (aka Lanu) from the Bamboos and it has a fairly similar feel to the Bamboos vocal songs. This is the first single and what I would consider (so far) to be the best song on the album.

It also seems to be part of a larger move in the new soul “movement” to dial the sound back from 1973 to 1967. I think it’s cool that people are being creative and switching it up but that “everyone” seems to be doing at the same time (Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings “Tell Me” and the 100 Days, 100 Nights album is the best example I can think of) makes me think of this music as trendy and makes it a lot harder to idealize it as timeless (which I enjoy doing).

Thematically, this song bears a strong resemblance to Bill Wither’s “Lonely Town, Lonely Street.”

“Community Service Announcement” opening line:

Living in the jungle
Is same as living in the town
If your not living near your brothers
We all need someone around

“Lonely Town, Lonely Street” opening line:

You can live your life in a crowded city
You can walk along a crowded street
But the city really ain’t no bigger
Than the friendly people that you meet

I was really surprised to find a cover of the Jeff Buckley song I posted in March ‘07. I like to pretend that she was google-ing herself and found my site and decided to cover the song for me.

>> right-click –> here to download “Community Service Announcement” [10.3 MB].

We Are One
The Hot 8 Brass Band
Rock With the Hot 8 Brass Band, 2007

This song is a cover of a Maze featuring Frankie Beverly song from 1983. It’s an unlikely choice for a brass band but the harmonies sound so lovely with that instrumentation.

This album came out on Louisiana Red Hot Records 6 months before Hurricane Katrina in 2005 (with less appealing cover art). According to a poorly written press release on the Tru Thoughts website (the label that re-released the album), they were “inundated with thousands of enquiries about” the Hot 8’s version of “Sexual Healing.” These two sentence are particularly vexing:

After the hurricane the label never fully recovered and the track was pushed underground until it was brought to the attention of Tru Thoughts A&R Robert Luis when Quantic started dropping it in his DJ sets. People have been swapping CDRs and MP3s to get hold of the track ever since and it has received a remarkable response from DJs such as Gilles Peterson, Rob Da Bank and Coldcut getting in touch with Tru Thoughts eager to get hold of their own copy.

Wait, ever since what? It sounds like they are saying that these go from being underground to mainstream by merely entering the consciousness of Robert Luis. Tru Thoughts released “500 exclusive copies” of the single in October 2007 (although they can’t be that “exclusive” as the album came out two weeks later). I first heard this song in a Daz-I-Kue DJ set at Winter Music Conference in March of 2007 so it seems the swapping was in full effect many months before the Tru Thoughts release. I guess what is more likely is that he was leaking the mp3 to high profile djs but they should just say that.

Anyway, the music is great so who cares about everything else.

>> songs are available for two weeks [15.5 MB]

Summertime
Bobby Womack & The Roots
Red Hot + Rhapsody, 1998

This is another Dale Mixtape Classic that I finally acquired while out in San Francisco last week. This was the opening song on the second mixtape he made me (circa 1999) which cemented his “people’s champ” status. I got all excited when I found a promo Levi’s “Red Hot and Rhapsody” sampler for $2 at Amoeba with the song on it, but it’s an edit and cuts off the spoken intro which arguably the best part of the song…boo. Luckily I also ripped the full album from my new b.f.f. Valerie.

Red Hot + Rhapsody is part of an ongoing compilation series by the Red Hot Organization which is “the leading international organization dedicated to fighting AIDS through pop culture.” RH+ Rhapsody is tribute to George Gershwin, there’s also Red Hot + Riot which is a tribute to Fela and several others.

Other than Bobby Womack’s voice and his bastardization of Gershwin’s classic lyrics (like “fish are steady jumping”), the upright bass (Leonard Hubbard I presume) really makes the song.

Can anyone tell me what’s going on with the bugged-out backing vocals at 4:29? It sounds like he’s singing in harmonics - is that possible?

>> songs are available for two weeks [13.8 MB]

I Get Lifted
Orgōne
The Killion Floor, 2007

I don’t do top 10’s or 25’s each year but if I did, this album would surely be near the top of my 2007 list. I’ve listened to it probably twice and I’ve already rated 8 songs with three or more “stars” in iTunes. Orgōne are Los Angeles based and they apparently have some members in common with Breakestra. This is their debut album and and it’s on (the eerily consistent) Ubiquity Records which is no stranger to this blog.

Orgōne first get on my radar from their cover of The Beginning of the End’s “Funky Nassau” which came out Ubiquity’s Rewind! 4 compilation a few years back. I guess they decided to go with their previous formula for success and released this cover as their first single. They stretch George McCrae’s original 2:46 version to 7:26 and make use of all 5 extra minutes.

Fanny Franklin is on lead vocals on both songs and I would definitely like to hear more from here in the very near future. She wrote the lyrics and melody to “Said and Done” which is the song I’ve been playing the most so far.

This version of “I Get Lifted” is more epic then all of the other versions I know, including the George McCrae, KC & The Sunshine Band (my previous favorite) and Sweet Music versions. It’s too early to tell if it will stay my favorite but right now it’s winning because it seems to incorporate the best elements of each version.

If you like what you hear, I strongly encourage you to pick up the album; you can get it directly from Ubiquity or from Dusty Groove.

>> songs are available for two weeks (192 kbps) [10.3 MB]
>> songs are available for two weeks (320 kbps) [17.2 MB]

Once Around The Block
Shawn Lee’s Ping Pong Orchestra
Hits the Hits!, 2007

My friend Cocoe from Ubiquity Records just sent me some treats in the mail which included this track which I couldn’t resist posting even though the stellar Orgōne album was vying for attention. This song is a cover of the Badly Drawn Boy song that I posted 2 1/2 years go. Not like I thought the song was my secret or anything but I was really surprised to find it on a CD with covers of (what I think of as) much bigger hits like “Hey Ya” by OutKast and songs by Justin Timberlake, Britney Spears, The Gorillaz, Amy Winehouse and Missy Elliot.

Shawn Lee generally finds a nice balance of playing stripped-down funky versions of these songs while not going overboard on the irony factor (there’s a little, for sure). I guess novelty factor is another thing that makes “Once Around the Block” seem out of place on this album. He covers it with basically the same instrumentation, substituting flute for lead vocals and throwing in some nice touches like an interpolation of “My Favorite Things.”

Here’s a snippet of his covers of “1 Thing” by Amerie and “Hey Ya.” Can anyone tell me what wind instrument that is in the Amerie cover??

>> songs are available for two weeks [5.1 MB]
>> songs are available for two weeks [8.5 MB]

Wichita Lineman
The Nite-Liters
Instrumental Directions, 1972

Song writer Jimmy Webb makes his second appearance on my blog. I didn’t know this song before hearing it on this record but apparently it was a big hit for (country-ish singer) Glen Campbell and was covered by tons of people. A quick google search shows that “Wichita Lineman” has it’s own wikipedia entry that lists 34 covers of the song (although it doesn’t list this one) and says that it’s in Rolling Stones Top 500 songs of all time.

For some reason it didn’t occur to me that this song would have lyrics - the horn melodies seem whole and complete without words. I think this song makes the case that the world needs more (non-honking) baritone saxophone (see 1:46 and 2:04/2:08).

P.S. - I am cooking up a podcast idea for music like this that doesn’t fit well into the DJ-set format (and I have much more music like this than I do “dj-friendly” music so it should be a nice outlet).

>> songs are available for two weeks (192 kbps) [7.1 MB]
>> songs are available for two weeks (320 kbps) [11.9 MB]

Welcome To the Terrordome
Pharoahe Monch
Desire, 2007

Wow…what to say? So many things…I’m not a hip hop historian by any means but I can’t name another hip hop cover, can you? And if there is one (there must be) I bet that it was supposed to be funny a la Weird Al.

This is a very well-timed appropriation. Public Enemy’s original came out in March of 1990, during the George Bush Sr.’s presidency, 5 months before the first gulf war. By most approximations everything that was going wrong then is much worse now (not to mention “new” problems like unlimited wiretapping). Accordingly, Pharoahe uses Chuck D’s entire first verse but writes his own second verse to incorporate new themes.

Unfortunately I don’t have the liner notes so I can’t get more info like who produced the song and whether or not the horns are from 70’s Bay Area funk group Tower of Power who are featured on another track on this album. Tower of Power were ahead of their time, opening their 1974 Urban Renewal album with “Only So Much Oil In The Ground.” I say they were ahead of their time but what do I know? I wasn’t around and maybe it was already a big issue at that point. Either way, kudos to them for writing lyrics like this at any time:

There is only so much oil on the ground
Sooner or later there won’t be much around
Tell that to your kids while you driving ’round downtown
That there’s only so much oil on the ground

Can’t cut loose without that juice
Can’t cut loose without that juice
If we keep on like we doin’
Things for sure will not be cool
It’s a fact we just ain’t got suffiecient fuel

Cause there’s only so much oil in the ground
Sooner or later there won’t be none around
Alternate sources of power must be found
Cause there’s only so much oil in the ground

Yes there’s only so much oil in the earth
It’s a fact of life for what it’s worth
Something every little boy and girl should know from birth
That there’s only so much oil in the earth

There’s no excuse for our abuse
No excuse for our abuse
We just assume that what we use will not exceed the oil supply
But soon enough the world will watch the wells run dry

Does anyone recnognize the speech at the beginning of Pharoahe’s version? I’m wondering if that’s something they did for the record if it’s from an actual public speech.

>> songs are available for two weeks (192 kbps) [5.0 MB]
>> songs are available for two weeks (320 kbps) [8.2 MB]

Too Fly
Dwele
CDR, 2000

The image above is pre-Subject (Dwele’s first album) but isn’t actually the art for this song. To my knowledge there isn’t any. The history of this song is a little hazy so if someone knows more about the actual history of the song (not just my story about it), like if it just circulated on CDR or if it came out on 12″ and what got it from a Detroit bedroom into the hands and minds of big European DJs, please leave a comment and I will add an update to the post.

It took me 2 years to figure what this song was and 4 more to get it. The story starts in early 2000 when I was just about to leave my job at Sony and Ben Dietz handed me a copy of the British release of (mix cd) the INCredible Sounds of Gilles Peterson (very recommended) which Sony was going to release in the US in a few months (thank you Ben). I had no idea who Gilles was at the time but I put the CD on and was appropriately wowed; it was everything that was missing from my musical experience working there.

Fast forward to July 2001, after my very short tenure at my second record label job, I was working in non-profit (and reading All Music Guide bios and album reviews of 70’s soul and funk for literally 6 hours a day) and starting to dig for records to augment my meager LP collection. This is when my family took a trip to London. Having read in the liner notes of the Gilles Peterson album that he had a weekly party at Bar Rumba, I decided to go. He wasn’t actually there the night I went but whoever was holding it down for him played this song. It’s the only song I remember because while it was playing I had a moment where I stopped and thought, “there are a room full of people full out jamming to this hypnotic night-timey R&B song that they all seem to know (and I wish I knew) after midnight on a Monday!” It was something I had never seen in NYC.

Now to 2003(?), I was working at Giant Step (a marketing company/label and one of the labels that put out the American version of the Gilles Peterson album) where I was introduced to Dwele via an advanced CDR of his Subject album but I was warned that his music had veered towards major-label smoothness and was missing the raw feeling of his early stuff…which someone had…at home. I never followed through.

Somewhere between then and now I connected that the “raw early stuff” mentioned at Giant Step contained the magic song from Bar Rumba but it was until DJ Scribe played it in Sweden last month that I finally got my hands on it.

Ok, that was a lot of build up…oh well, played it loud.

>> songs are available for two weeks (192 kbps) [7.6 MB]
>> songs are available for two weeks (320 kbps) [12.7 MB]

Stop Me Medly
Mark Ronson
Version (Sampler), Album Coming Out July 10

I had already started another post but this just came in the mail today from the good folks at Giant Step, so I switched gears and decided to post this. I saw the video for this song last week via the Fader Blog and have been on the lookout for it since. This is a combination of The Smiths’ “Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before” from Strangeways, Here We Come (1987) and Diana Ross & The Supremes’ “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” from The Supremes Sing Holland-Dozier-Holland (1966) and it features Daniel Merriweather on vocals.

This song has reportedly reached #2 on the UK pop charts and I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s well-received here too, especially as it’s coming close on the heels of the growing success of his production of Amy Winehouse and Lily Allen.

Obviously a lot of people have attempted to recreate the analog early seventies sound with varying degrees of success and it seems that Mark has a solid grasp on what makes it work. The first hint was came with his funk cover of “Just” on the Exit Music: Songs for Radio Heads compilation that I posted last year. Then came the brilliant pairing of the Dap-Kings with Amy Winehouse and now this (he returned to the Daptone Studios to record portions of “Valerie” for this album). I suppose the all retro/analog/covers thing could wear thin but I’m not sick of it yet and I have the feeling that Mark Ronson has the good sense to switch it up before tire of it.

Dale, is this the song you played me on the train?

>> songs are available for two weeks [5.0 MB]

Every Time I See You, I Go Wild!
Brainstorm
Journey Into The Light, 1978

This is “great covers installment #2″(see below) and as I said in this post from last year, I think people shouldn’t cover songs unless they are going to do a completely different version or out-perform the original. This is a cover of a Stevie Wonder song that I posted a year ago (almost to the day). Brainstorm take Stevie’s almost frantic take on the song and slow it down from 117 to 100 beats per minute and change the whole vibe of the song to something much more lusty. They basically change the meaning of “go wild” from “you make me feel unstable” to “let’s get a room.”

Brainstorm were a funky-disco group from Detroit that put out three albums in the late 70’s but never got much commercial recognition although I do think they got significant club play. This mp3 is from vinyl but it looks like this album has been reissued on CD, in fact Dusty Groove is illegally selling promo-only copies for $7.99!

>> songs are available for two weeks [9.7 MB]